An Historical Perspective

[Anomalocaris]

That’s the Roman propaganda - Roman simple virtues triumphant over Carthaginian perfidy and decadence, which is in no small part an artifact of later Romans trying to sooth the deep trauma experienced and long lasting insecurity inflicted when Hannibal brought Romans to the conviction that Rome's final demise in the hands of Carthage could be very near.

The reality seems to have more to do with Romans and Carthaginians  having filled all the vacuum available after the Greek city states in southern Italy and Sicily had declined in power and the Hellenistic powers the rose after Alexander had withdrawn, they had no other enemies in their own environs to confront than each other.   Rome triumphed because Rome had a far larger manpower pool, and a political system fighting a 3rd century equivalent of total war and thus willing and able to draw its manpower reserve down almost to the last without giving up, while Carthage fought a limited war and its political system proved unwilling to thrown the last measure onto the balance to seal the deal when  prowess of her generals had brought her to the very cusp of final victory.

Actually, Rome triumphed (eventually) because it had a largely citizen army, whereas the Carthaginian army depended largely on mercenaries.  Towards the end, both powers had liquidity problems.  This didn't matter so much for Rome, but mercenaries have a tendency to pack up and go home when they aren't paid.

Additionally, Rome copied Carthaginian naval technology (with a few tweaks, such as the crow), while Carthage didn't bother to learn anything from Roman land tactics.  If they had, things might have gone differently.

Also, elephants have never been a particularly effective military tool.

Boru

Carthage relied on mercenaries because Carthage is a single city state with relatively modest hinterland and no real culturally close kin within its own sphere of influence.  As a result it had a far smaller native population pool from which to draw for citizen soldiers.   But it had far superior commercial expertise and very high amount of liquid capital because of its long standing commercial success and large commercial empire.   So mercenaries is how Carthage can match the wealth of manpower Rome can draw from its own hinterland and its Italian subject allies.   Carthage capitalizes on its own wealth and manufacturing base by maintaining a huge state sponsored military equipment  stockpiles that allowed it to equip a mercenary army fully equal to the Roman field army in size at the beginning of the 2nd Punic war.   Even at the beginning of the 3rd Punic war, Carthage still had within the city 140,000 sets of complete heavy infantry equipment.

It is entirely untrue Carthage didn’t bother to learn anything from the Roman tactics.  They did far better than learn from Roman land tactics.  Leading Carthaginian generals during the second Punic war far surpassed the Romans in land tactics, and consistently used various mercenary forces to beat far superior Superior numbers of Roman legionaries in pitched battles during the entire first half of the war, including dealing the Legionary army its heaviest defeat ever at cannae, wiping out in one day the largest and most powerful Roman force yet committed to any single theater of operation, and in the process killing more Roman legionaries and their Italian subject allies in pitched battle of the type the Romans thought they were most adept at fighting than the total number of men the Carthaginian force had committed to battle, while suffering relatively modest casualties overall in return and preserving the most experienced, battle hardened and loyal African core of the Carthaginian army from suffering any significant casualties at all.

It was only rome’s vast manpower reserve that allowed her to survive and recover from defeat such as this, to hem Hannibal’s in and tie him down with harassing and delaying tactics by numerous superior armies, and despite superiority, studiously avoiding any pitched battle against Hannibal for the fear of another cataclysmic defeat,  until they overwhelmed Carthage in all the secondary theaters so they can threaten Carthage herself, forcing Hannibal to retreat to protect Carthage. 

So great was Carthaginian tactical mastery that cannae was held up as the epitome of tactical excellence by Von Schliffen and still taught as the singular example of the perfectly conducted battle in modern military staff colleges.