Hannibal, arguably one of the best tactitians of all time

I was recently watching the history channel and they had a show on that talked about different leaders throughout history. This particular episode was about Hannibal of Carthage. The show talked about everything that he went through during the 2nd Punic War.

For those of us who don't know the 2nd punic war took place basically in modern day italy between Carthage and Rome. Hannibal was the young leader of the Carthaginians and had a deep running hatred towards rome. Because of this hatred he decided to try to invade Rome and destroy the city.

Hannibal had to try and get into roman territory but couldnt do so because of a roman army was in his way, so instead of trying to take on the army, which greatly outnumbered him, he decided to take his army through the alps. This move alone is what Hannibal is greatly known for, he took his army through the alps, but what was even more amazing is that he had a bunch of war elephants that went with him through the alps. Though him and his army did make it through the alps, it wasn't without a cost, Hannibal lost about 1/3 of his army doing so.

After he entered italy, Hannibal faced a couple of battles against the romans and won all of them. He had to rely on certain tribes to defect to him in order to get more men for his army. He defeated every legion that the romans sent at him(some outnumbered him by more than 2-1) and eventually they gave up trying to defeat him and went to other tactics. He eventually lost when he was forced to go back to northern africa in order to defend carthage. Even though he lost, he is still recognized as the father of strategy because of some of his impressive wins over a far greater roman army.