Who Was Caesar The Best Military Leader?

“It is better to die once than live always in fear of death.” From the time Caesar became consul everybody knew he would be the greatest leader that Rome has ever seen. The heroic and courageous leader, Julius Caesar, has proven over time that he is the best military leader because of his exceptional work in leading his army, winning the Gallic Wars, and defeating Pompey in the Roman Civil War. Julius Caesar was the kind of man that didn’t hide behind his army; he led. Suetonius once said, “He always led his army, more often on foot than in the saddle.” Caesar placed a lot of trust in his army by letting them do basically what they wanted, unless there was a deserter then they would be punished. Suetonius also said, “He judged his men by their fighting record, not by their morals or social position.” Caesar also lived with his men while they were on the road to battle. Caesar’s men looked up to him and trusted his opinion. They always were ready to fight for him through whatever problems arised. Although this might be partially because Caesar was a ruthless man while battling, he would even cut off people’s hands(Meier).They trusted him so much that they went head to head with Pompey’s sons and won. But the shocker was that Caesar had 40,000 men and Pompey’s sons had …show more content…
The Gallic War began in 58 b.c.e. and it lasted until 49 b.c.e.. It took Caesar nine long years to finally defeat the country of Gaul. Gaul put up a good fight against Caesar but he was able to defeat them because they had tribes and it was easy for Caesar to defeat many small armies rather than one large army. We have to remember that three hundred years earlier Gaul defeated Rome. After Gaul, Caesar went on to defeat Alesia in 52 b.c.e. Although Caesar won the Gallic Wars back in Rome, people were loosing fate in him. The Senate soon named Caesar a traitor and took his position