The siege of Tyre revealed Alexander the Great’s superior siege warfare tactics against the Tyrians. This study highlights Alexander’s strategy, tactics, techniques, and procedures.
The siege of Tyre was Alexander the Great’s master stroke when he employed his military strategy, tactics, and operations with his Macedonian combat engineers, naval forces , and infantrymen, of about 30,000 military personnel, against a major Phoenician city subject to Persia, with a population of about 60,000 Tyrians. Alexander’s conquest of Persia was impossible without control of the sea. He did not have a naval force that was equal to the Persian fleet, thus he went out to violently remove the threat by taking the Persian-held sea-ports of the eastern Mediterranean coast, including the ancient biblical island city of Tyre.
Tyre was located in southern Lebanon and was an island about 4.5 kilometers in circumference, just off the ancient Phoenician coast during the days of Alexander the Great. The Phoenician city of Tyre was one of the best fortified cities of all time. However, since the subjugation of the city was vital to Alexander the Great’s plans for conquest of the Persian Empire, Alexander’s Macedonian Army laid siege on Tyre from January to August of 332 BCE. This siege was the most challenging military operation of more than 20 sieges conducted by Alexander’s Macedonian Army. The seven-month siege and final conquest of Tyre displayed Macedonian combat engineering skills and battlefield tactics at the highest level in the ancient world.
KING ALEXANDER THE GREAT
Alexander was 20 years old when he became King after his father’s assassination in 336 BCE. His father’s wars had left the royal treasury empty, but Alexander recognized that if he could conquer the wealthy Persian Empire, his economic problems would be solved. His first campaign against the Persians in 334 BCE gave him control of Asia Minor (Turkey). Later, he added Egypt to his Empire. In 333 BCE, Alexander defeated the Persian King Darius during the battle of Issus and by 331 BCE all Persia was under Alexander’s control.
Alexander’s final military expedition was in India, where he won the battle of Hydaspes. Since his Macedonian Army experienced terrible losses in the battle of Hydaspes, his troops refused to go any further into India. Alexander was forced to return to the city of Babylon, where he made it his capital. By 323 BCE, at the age of 33, he died from a fever probably brought on from many battle injuries, being poisoned, drunkenness’, and hard living. His generals were left to fight over Alexander’s vast empire that stretched from Greece to India.
SIEGE WARFARE: ANALYSIS AND TACTICS
The siege of a Tyre began in several stages while it displayed Alexander’s tactics and determination to defeat the Tyrians. First, the island city of Tyre was surrounded on all sides by high walls about 50 meters high in many places. These fortified structures, along with the number of Tyrian warships that defended the primeval seas surrounding the city, made the city extremely inaccessibility to foreign invaders and thus making the prospect of besieging Tyre a daunting military task.
When Alexander’s Macedonian Army arrived on the shore opposite Tyre, Alexander asked for the city’s peaceful surrender and the opportunity to make religious sacrifices in the city’s temple. After Alexander’s requests were refused by the Tyrians, he ordered his combat engineers to begin building a mole about 550 meters long, between the shore and the island city of Tyre. Alexander’s Macedonian Greek navy blockaded the island with a fleet of warships.
When Alexander’s mole neared completion, his combat engineers constructed two large siege towers and these weapon systems were moved to the end of the mole to protect his workers. However, the Tyrians sent out fire ships and destroyed the Macedonian siege towers. When the Tyrians began to suffer from Alexander’s blockade, they sent out warships to aggressively attack Alexander’s Macedonian, Greek, and Phoenician warships, but they failed to defeat Alexander’s surface vessels and were ultimately destroyed in the naval engagement.
Finally, when the mole reached the island city of Tyre, Macedonian catapults began pounding the walls and its defenders. The Tyrians defended their city courageously and fiercely, but once their walls were breached south of the mole they could not prevent the entrance of Alexander and his Macedonian warriors, which ultimately led to Tyre’s fall.
SIEGE WARFARE: AFTERMATH AND SIGNIFICANCE
Although Alexander was noted for showing mercy to his defeated adversaries, he made an example of the Tyrians. This behavior was typical of ancient military commanders because if a city refused to surrender and had to be taken by force, the triumphant army had a widely recognized right to slaughter, rape and pillage indiscriminately the city’s inhabitants. The fall of Tyre gave King Alexander the Great complete control of the eastern Mediterranean Sea, Phoenicia, and ancient Israel.
The siege of Tyre demonstrated that Alexander was one of the greatest siege commanders in the ancient world because he defeated the city’s protection, which had high walls and a powerful naval fleet. The city withstood a five-year Assyrian siege around 700 BCE, an
RELATED SOURCES: Roberts, Andrew; The Art of War: Quercus Publication, 2009. Zimmerman, Dwight, D.; The Book of War; Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, 2008. Zimmerman, Dwight D.; The Book of Weapons, Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, 2009.