117 - Alexander's Sack of Thebes, w/ Victor Davis Hanson

A conversation with American classicist, military historian, and conservative political commentator Victor Davis Hanson.

We discuss:

• Why Epaminondas remains one of the most underrated commanders in Greek history, and how the loss of Plutarch's Life of Epaminondas has obscured his legacy
• The pivotal liberation of Thebes in 378 BC: how a small band of conspirators overthrew the Spartan-backed oligarchy and sparked a democratic revolution
• Epaminondas's strategic masterstroke at Leuctra — the deep oblique phalanx on the left — and how it shattered 200 years of Spartan military supremacy
• How freeing the Messenian Helots and building Megalopolis, Mantinea, and Messene permanently encircled and emasculated Sparta as a great power
• The fatal miscalculation of 335 BC: why Thebes revolted against Alexander on the basis of a false rumor, and how every potential ally abandoned them
• The recurring pattern of doomed civilizations — from Thebes to Carthage to Constantinople — that share delusions about allies, enemies, and their own decline
• What ancient history reveals about America's current strengths and vulnerabilities, from demographic pressures to the China threat

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