Conquering Germania was their original plan, Britannia only became the new target after the disaster of Teutoburg. So what if their original plan of conquering Germania actually succeeded?I assume the Elbe would be a shorter border to defend versus the Rhine and defending against the migrating barbarians would, therefore, be easier.
It wasn't. Teutoburg was overblown by German romanticist historians who wanted to find to some kind of ideal hero figure and story for German history. Germania was pretty much all untamed forest at that time without any resources unlike Britain which had mines for important metals, the Romans launched successful punitive expeditions after Teutoburg and forced the Germanic tribes from the Rhine to the Elbe to pay tribute. They had military outposts deep into Germania long after it, and there was a Roman fort discovered in what is now Thuringia.
It would make the Roman Empire very internally unstable, because they just Incorporated a huge territory full of thick forests. Also the surviving Germans would have travelled east and fought a brutal war with the steppe people there. Since in the original timeline a Germanic people, the Huns, almost ended the Roman Empire. In this timeline whoever emerges out of this existential conflict is going to be just as bad as the Huns, if not worse.>>18514043> They had military outposts deep into Germania long after it, and there was a Roman fort discovered in what is now Thuringia.I mean sure? But this is only surprising to people, who think the Roman limes was a hard wall, which separated Civilization from "Orc Land", where any contact between Romans and Germans were prohibited. Even though in actual history Germans adopted all of the Roman military technology and mogged them, because once they adopted their technology, their naturally superiority made them better warriors than the multicultural and multiracial armies of the Roman Empire.
>>18514388>It would make the Roman Empire very internally unstable, because they just Incorporated a huge territory full of thick forests. Also the surviving Germans would have travelled east and fought a brutal war with the steppe people there.That makes no sense. Why would conquest destabalise other parts of the Roman Empire completely unrelated to them? Why would Germanic people mass migrate out of the region? >Since in the original timeline a Germanic people, the Huns, almost ended the Roman EmpireThere is no evidence they were Germanic, we have evidence that the Hephthalites which broke off from them earlier on probably spoke a Turkic language, and they didn't 'almost end the Roman Empire'. They completely failed in the West and were no different from the Ostrogoths in the East, as a nuisance.>Even though in actual history Germans adopted all of the Roman military technologyEverybody did. This didn't make them better at warfare than the Romans. They weren't making hellfire missiles, adopting a different form of helmet isn't rocket science and it didn't change the inherit dynamic between the two otherwise they would have become peers in the early 3rd century.
>>18514043>Germania was pretty much all untamed forest at that timeSo was Gaul >without any resourcesTimber aren’t resources?
>>18514043Braindead take.It had been the case since Caesar or Augustus that Romans actively planned to push further north into Germania and keep it. There would have been no attempt if this wasn't the case and we know from records this was the latter's plan. Putting legions together and building roads was not a thing done for shits and gigs. They could not militarily take the north or justify the cost of holding what could be taken. Every single place has resources. Some do not have roads or even towns or people that share any of your values. Had pushovers populated the north it would have been taking for the timber alone. Around Austria and Germany there was loess soil restored since the neolithic that would have been god tier land for Latifundia and emp*re to spread. But when tall demons that fight and rape even harder than Celts continuously pour out of cold lands you don't know anything about it kind of crushes the incentive. Better to hunker down or try Persia (again) I guess bro.
>>18514021Instead of having to deal with cross Rhine raids they are now going to have to deal with cross channel raids and piracy all along the coast of modern day Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, France, maybe even Spain. That’s a lot to have to defend. I don’t know if that’s an improvement though
>>18514021It all depends on how quickly the germans are pacified and romanized. The border would be shorter, but more far from Rome. Many germans being romanized would probably speed up the civilization of those left indipendent. And more civilization = less chimp outsBritannia was also bound to be a pain the ass regardless. Instead of wasting legions in the isles defending from proto-scots and irish, a indipendent Britannia would had means wasting legions on the northen coast of Gaul to fends off britonnic raids
>>18514484Gauls were far more civilized. Each tribe had a rather centralized capital that was a city on its own, many of them minted money, laity had a writing system to use in everyday stuff, and before the Roman Law the Druidic Priesthood ensured most of them were united in a loose confederation. Once genocided the priests and ensured the loyalties of the secular gaulish aristocracy, the region became pacified and quickly romanized Germans in the same timeframe were instead far more primitive and unorganized
