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James Erwin, 37, works for a financial services firm in Des Moines, Iowa, writing software manuals. He’s been doing that for a couple of years, and he enjoys it. It’s a pretty low-stress job for a person with a methodical turn of mind—good pay, short commute. He’s home by 5:30 every night to spend time with his wife and 1-year-old son.

One Wednesday last August, Erwin rose from his desk around noon. He walked to the company lunchroom, microwaved a pretzel-bread Hot Pocket, and carried it back to his desk on a paper towel. He took a bite of the Hot Pocket and logged in to Reddit.com.

Reddit is a sprawling news site, where “news” is defined by its tens of millions of users—one of the largest communities on the Internet. Anyone can post a link or a comment, and everything on the site, down to the tiniest squib of text, wears a pair of clickable arrows—one up and one down. The site constructs itself on the fly by tabulating billions of “upvotes” and “downvotes.” Popular items rise, unpopular items fall. More reliably than Twitter, more scientifically than Facebook, Reddit answers this question: What do people on the Internet think is important, funny, cute, gross, uplifting—right now?

It’s common for random questions to appear on Reddit’s front page, like “Is there a magnet capable of pulling the iron out of your body?” or “What is the most awkward thing you could say to a cashier while purchasing condoms?” That day, as Erwin scanned Reddit, a question caught his eye. It was posed by someone calling themselves The_Quiet_Earth: “Could I destroy the entire Roman Empire during the reign of Augustus if I traveled back in time with a modern U.S. Marine infantry battalion or MEU [Marine Expeditionary Unit]?” Erwin clicked on the question and a lively comment thread unfurled. Hundreds of people were whipping hypotheticals back and forth, gaming out the implications of a marines-versus-Romans smackdown. What’s the range of a Roman spear? How would the Romans react to a helicopter? What would happen when the Americans ran out of bullets?

 

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A MEU with all of its support including air support, then yes they could blitzkrieg to Rome.

 

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They would decisively win battles until they ran out of fuel and bullets. They would then have no technological advantage, and in fact would be at a disadvantage having to adapt to the world in which the Roman army lived, plus they would be overwhelmed by superior numbers.

You run out of fuel and bullets before you can conquer the whole thing IMO.

 

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They would make a serious dent, but eventually Roman numbers alone would crush them.

 

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The Romans would crush them. Gas and bullets would run out in one large battle. With no communications or modern GPS they wouldnt be able to coordinate air strikes or ground movements. It'd be over quickly after that first battle I think.

 

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wouldnt have to head straight to Rome, cut the head off.this would depend on where the meu was deployed and if that meu still had support of the gator navy.

a platoon of abrams rolling into rome with cobra gunships and harriers flying support.

the tech level that a modern meu would bring would make them gods.

even a bic lighter would make someone a minor deity.

@Cutt Marines still learn how to use a compass and map, in bootcamp or mct.

 

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especially combined with limited ammo and fuel

 

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I think you are missing the piece about even finding Rome. No GPS, no modern communication. Unless they were right on top of Rome they'd never even find Rome before running out of gas. A compass doesnt do a lot of good, if you dont know where you are, and have no map.

 

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Even if they did take out Rome itself, the Empire itself is so vast that they would be able to pull as many troops as it took to retake with sheer numbers.

 

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