Certainly do, so I am fully aware that 30 days self sustaining doesnt mean that if they were dropped into the middle of Great Britian in ancient times that they'd have enough fuel to make it to Rome for a war, especially with no navigation and no communication systems.

 

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I wonder what the effectiveness of a modern assault rifle is while firing homemade black powder and modified to work without percussion caps.

no actually i do, its an interesting 'post apocalyptic' scenario

 

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except they wherent dropped in England for ffs, they where dropped on the banks of the Tiber river which we know has a total length of only 250 ish miles, this is well with in strike range of a MEU.

and for the communication issue they are equipped with uhf comm's which are line of sight and they will also have hf radio's for over the horizon communication, at least the air wing has that ability.

 

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Modern Americans dont suffer the Darwinian natural selection for lethal diseases/infections that went on in ancient times. The vast majority of the marines would be dead as soon as the antibiotics ran out. By the same token tho, modern influenza would devastate the ancient world. Null sum game, noone wins.

Hell the roman WHORES would kill them within 6 months.

 

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I realize the world thinks of us as Jarheads who are the dumbest people on the earth but if you really think we'd be limited to just the supplies we brought you are kidding yourselves. Hell Iraq and Afghanistan are a PERFECT example, we barter for food and other things with the locals there constantly. Yes we get supplies from Germany and the States but alot of the supplies are also local.

Also, there would be no running out of bullets as everyone wants to assume... a Marine MEU's armory is designed to hold out for at least 6 months against equally armed and armored foes. The Romans are neither equally armored nor armored to stop anything a Marine would shoot at them... A .50 cal aka Ma Deuce would DESTROY an entire Formation of Romans without wasting much ammo, it would take down 3-5 Romans per SHOT... not to mention you have the Grenade launchers and Projectile weapons.

Now someone mentioned the Roman's siege engines... those would work great against the Hmmves... They would bounce of the Abrams. You also have the air assult that the Helos would impart. Again going back to Marines not being as dumb as everyone thinks they are... We would use the Helos sparingly.

The first thing the MEU would do is set up a base... they would set it up to be highly defensible with THEIR weapons... They would begin tearing apart anything deemed unncessary and start creating more ammunition. They would venture out in small teams to open relations with the locals and start bartering services and goods. After the initial base is set up they would then begin to emplace forward outposts, and defensible flanking positions manned with 50 cals and SAWs.

They would not march on Rome itself but let Rome come and try to conquer it. The Roman "melee advantage" would never exist.


As far as how I know all this dear Cuttlery... I've LIVED it. Something I'm 1000% certain you can't say yourself. Also, you have to take into consideration one other thing here... I'm agreeing with Sith despite the fact that I don't believe he was ever in the military.

 

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A MEU armor is given the equipment to make percussion caps and weapon's grade black powder... the ingredients are easily obtained in the ME.

 

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They were dropped on the Tiber river in this movie scenario, not in the origional question, which again you keep ignoring, which is why I keep asking you to ignore the movie script. You dont seem to understand that the movie script has nothing to do with the question. The movie script was one guys interpretation of the question, not the ultimate answer to the question. Again, you need to ignore the movie script and stick with the actual question being asked.

 

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They would all die from disease

I have no doubts about the Marines abilities, they cant make gas though. Once they run out of gas they have problems even with the ability to make bullets. Unless they are dropped in the ideal movie script situation that Sith keeps referring to its going to be a very very rough go. They have limited supplies of personel is their problem. If they build a base, they cant conquer Rome, they'd actually need to attack Rome to conquer it.

 

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then I can say they are dropped on the Tiber river too, thats my prerogative in this what if.

just because I am using the movie script for convenience

we could say they where dropped off in Noth America and they had to fight the Indians then.
or South America where they could have fought the Incas?
or ancient China etc...

if you want to use that excuse I can say the Marines can show up where ever the hell they want to if you want to go down that road.

 

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