Peloponnesian War Analysis

J. Boone Bartholomees, Jr. gives us the definition of strategic art, stating “it is the skillful formulation, coordination, and application of ends (objectives), ways (courses of action) and means (supporting resources) to promote and defend the national interests.”1 During the Peloponnesian War we see Sparta and Athens following and discarding the first words of the definition with sometimes skillful formulation of strategy, and at times anything but skillful strategy - completely ill-informed, unimaginative, and incomplete. We also see how well each city-state adapts to strategic realities through the first phase of the war. There are lessons in Thucydides history of the Peloponnesian War for strategists today on how a country develops a

strategy and then adapts the strategy or maintains the course if it is effective.
At the beginning of the war, Sparta’s ends are to decrease Athens’ power in the Greece. As Thucydides tells us Sparta went to war “because they feared the growth of the power of the Athenians, seeing most of Hellas already subject to them.”2 Sparta masks their objective, instead saying their objective is to free the Hellas from Athens as is seen in their final embassy to Athens before the start of the war.3
To accomplish this objective, Sparta plans to lure Athens into a decisive battle using their greatest strength, landpower. The Spartan King Archidamus plans to draw out Athenian land forces by destroying crops and homes on Attica to arouse the Athenians into a land battle.4 If they could force a decisive land battle, they could destroy the Athenian army and then capture Athens, bringing a quick end to the war. The Spartans had the means to accomplish this strategy with the most powerful land force and, along with their allies, the largest army seen in Greece to that time.5
Sparta’s initial strategy was rooted in culture and Greek history. Simplistic and unimaginative, the Spartan strategy focused on their strengths and avoided Athens’s military strength, her navy. From a Spartan cultural perspective, for the Athenians to do what they did, watching their crops and property be destroyed, would in the Spartan mind “be cowardly”6 and unthinkable. Could Sparta have conducted more analysis into the Athenian mind? Sure, but based on the history of Greek conflicts, as Donald Kagan remarked, there was no instance where an invaded state allowed the invader to do what they wanted without a political or military response, including Sparta’s invasion of Attica in 445 BC.7
The Spartan failure, up to 424 BC, was an incomplete strategy.

The Spartans did not heed Archidamus’ warning that “unless we can either beat them at sea, or deprive them of the revenues which feed their navy, we shall meet with little but disaster.”8 From the beginning, Sparta should have developed an alternative course of action, a branch plan in modern American military terms, to execute if the invasion of Attica did not quickly end the war. There was little time for Sparta to build or develop a naval force to match Athenian naval power, but an alternative plan to erode away the Athenian empire, similar to the one employed by Brasidas in 424 BC, was possible much earlier in the war and could have eroded Athenian financial support from their empire. For as Thucydides tells us, “the strength of Athens being derived from the money brought in by their [allies] payments.”9 Conditions were present for Sparta to reduce the Athenian empire as many Greeks wanted or feared losing their independence from the Athenian empire.10 While not excusing Sparta’s initial failure as described above, it is understandable, based on the conservative Spartan culture, why they did not develop an alternative course of action for defeating

Athens.
Sparta’s strategic failure continued from 431-425 BC, unable to achieve their objective. After the first fighting season it should have been clear the Athenians under Pericles leadership were not going to fight a land battle11 and the devastation of their lands would not weaken Athens because of the tributes and supplies from their empire as Archidamus had predicted.12 Still they stayed the course, invading Attica almost every year, executing the same course of action. Here B.H. Liddell Hart’s axiom, “Keep your object always in mind while adapting your plan to the circumstances”13 is very apt. While their objective may have been sound, an adaption of the ways of the strategy was necessary to meet their objective.
This adaption finally came in 424 BC when Brasidas led his army into the Athenian empire. The Spartan objective remained the same, to decrease Athenian power through freeing states from their empire.14 The means still included land power, but it was a different kind of soldier with Brasidas’ army with freed Helots instead of the Spartiate of the classic Spartan armies.15 The main difference of Spartan strategy from 424-422 BC was the ways employed by Brasidas. Instead of attacking Attica and laying waste to the countryside to force a decisive land battle, he marched his army into the fringes of the Athenian empire.16 Here he employed both diplomatic and military power during the expedition.
Brasidas uses diplomacy effectively during many parts of the expedition. His “just and moderate conduct”17 during the expedition garnered support within the Athenian empire and triggered states to revolt against Athens.18 The revolt of Acanthus engineered by Brasidas, albeit with the ominous threat of military force, is another diplomatic victory that led to additional revolts from Athens.19 His moderate surrender terms to Amphipolis quickly freed the city before the arrival of Athenian reinforcements.20 The surrender of Amphipolis using diplomacy, again backed by military force, was an enormous strategic advantage for Sparta. Not only did Sparta seize an important city in the Athenian empire (for its timber, tributes, and geographic location) the diplomatic nature of the surrender initiated even more revolts.21
Brasidas was not afraid to use military power when needed. His campaigns against Sane and Dium used military power to destroy their economic means.22 His attack on Torone, using stealth and force, gained him entrance into the city where he won a subsequent battle and occupied the city.23 His decisive battle at Amphipolis, using superior tactics against Cleon, kept the city in Spartan hands.24 This victory, along with the Athenian defeat at Delium, led Athens to sign the Peace of Nicias.25
Led by Brasidas, Sparta’s adaption of their strategic ways turned the momentum of the war. Prior to Brasidas’ expedition, Sparta was reeling from their failure to bring Athens to a land battle in Attica, their defeat at Pylos, and the subsequent Helot rebellion in Messenia. These actions put them on the strategic defensive, and as Thucydides describes, Sparta “fancied that they could not stir without a blunder, for being new to the experience of adversity they had lost all confidence in themselves.”26 After Brasidas’ victories they did not regain the strategic initiative, but they did take it from Athens, leading to the Peace of Nicias.
Athens would not deviate from their strategy as much as Sparta in the first phase of the war, especially compared to the drastic changes in Spartan strategy from 424-422 BC. Athens’ would stay the course through 422 BC, seizing a strategic opportunity at Pylos and gaining the strategic initiative over Sparta, which they would later lose as discussed above.
The Athenian objective was to maintain their empire and conduct affairs in their national interest without interference.27 Pericles developed the Athenian ways to achieve this objective. Thucydides clearly describes Pericles plan: first, all the citizens were to gather all their property and move into the walls of Athens; second, they would enter into a decisive land battle with the Spartans; third, they would ready their naval fleet, which was their military strength; and fourth, using their fleet, they would “keep a tight rein on their allies” to keep the city resupplied and the tributes continuing to flow into the treasury.28 In developing this strategy, Pericles anticipated wearing down the Peloponnesians, expecting they would see the futility in fighting the war against Athens.29 Essentially, Athens would maintain the strategic defensive, maintaining their empire and the tributes which were so essential to the city. They would also conduct naval raids along the coast of Peloponnesus not to gain territory, but to affect the psychology of the Peloponnesians.30 Athens had the means to execute this strategy, with plenty of money in their treasury and the strongest fleet in Greece.31
In the first phase of the war, the Athenian strategy would be generally successful in meeting the city’s objective of maintaining the status quo but very costly to the citizens. Athens had to endure many years of watching their country ravaged by the Peloponnesians and would continue to drain their treasury.32 Thucydides describes both common and prominent men lost much of their property33 and social order in Athens began to break down as a result of both the war and the plague34 as Athens followed Pericles strategy. The suffering was so great, some of the citizens sent envoys to Sparta to attempt a peace negotiation, which they later rejected at Pericles request.35
The greatest accomplishment of Athens during the first part of the war is the capture of Pylos. As discussed before, part of the Athenian strategy was to use their superior naval power to raid along the Peloponnesus coast. Almost by accident, though a part of Demosthenes plan, the Athenians land at Pylos and build a fort.36 The resulting fortification turns into a strategic opportunity for Athens. Demosthenes sees they can continue to harass the Peloponnesus coast and support a Messenian revolt and land raids against Laconia, the Spartan heartland.37 As an additional benefit, the occupation causes the withdrawal of the Spartan army from Attica.38 The subsequent battle and defeat of the Spartans gives the Athenians the strategic initiative in the war with Sparta losing her confidence and dealing with a Helot revolt.
This is the Athenian strategic failure in the first part of the war.

After the defeat, busy with defending their lands and putting down a revolution, Sparta sues for peace, which Athens rejects as they “kept grasping at more.”39 If the Athenian objective was to maintain her empire and conduct affairs in her national interest without interference, then Athens should have accepted the Spartan peace offer. Instead, they reject the offer, convinced by their recent success they can get more if they continue the war. The war continuing, Sparta is forced to change course in their strategy and free a number of Helots to join Brasidas for his expedition into Thrace and Chalcidice. As described before, Brasidas decisively defeats Cleon at Amphipolis and takes the strategic initiative away from Athens. This defeat will be a major reason for peace between Athens and Sparta, but a peace not as favorable as one after

Pylos.
By the end of the first phase of the Peloponnesian War, which concluded with the Peace of Nicias, Sparta adapted their strategy to strategic realities, though too late to gain victory. Athens, with their still strong navy and stable (yet threatened) financial resources, maintained their original strategy, seized the strategic initiative, yet squandered it attempting to overreach from their strategic objective. In fact, it is when Athens overreaches again and alters her objectives with the Sicilian Expedition that we can see the beginning of the end of the war.