Roman Greed and Conquest and their role in Genocide

The one major genocide by the Romans was on Carthage during the 3rd Punic War. Was this a defensive or aggressive imperialism at work? This question was raised about the Roman Empire during their imperialistic age. The answer for this was pretty obviously aggressive. Since the Carthaginians at the time did not pose a real threat to Roman control, this was not a defensive attack.

They had even taken all of the weapons from the citizens of Carthage so they would had little to no defense for their civilization. This shows that Carthage was not a threat and therefore there was a total aggressive action to destroy their civilization.

Now Carthage had been a big threat earlier on in Roman rule but by this point they had already relieved that threat in the first two Punic Wars. So this furthers the hypothesis that the Roman conquest was an aggressive attack and not a defensive necessity.