The Byzantine Empire’s Strategy Towards Persia During The Age Of Justinian(527-565)

Justinian I is an important emperor in Byzantine history,after the death of his uncle Justin I in 527,Justinian reigned as sole ruler of the Empire for nearly 40 years.He had a profound influence on the political landscape of Europe and the Middle East in the 6th century.Chinese and foreign scholars generally regard Justinian as a transitional figure in Rome and Byzantine history.During his ruling period,the late antiquity Roman empire changed as the early middle ages Byzantine empire.Meanwhile Justinian’s rule from the political,military,cultural,and other aspects of the Byzantine empire regime after nearly one thousand years of existence laid a foundation.Justinian’s era is famous for the large-scale military conquest in the history of the empire.As Justinian himself aimed at restoring the territory of the former Roman Empire,during this period,the Byzantine Empire wantonly sent army against the Barbarian states of Europe that occupied the territory of the former Western Roman Empire.However,as the traditional eastern neighbor of Roman-Byzantine State,the Sassanid Persian Empire also emerged from its decline in the 5th century and pushed into a rising stage of development in the 6th century,they began to competing with the Byzantine Empire in Caucasus and Middle East,where both countries have a conflict of interest.Therefore,in the face of the established goal of conquering western territories,how to deal with the relationship with Persia,a traditional neighbor and arch-enemy,has become an important national strategy in Justinian’s time,that is,the focus of this paper.In this paper,the study of Persian strategy in Justinian’s era mainly introduces military strategy,economic strategy and diplomatic strategy,and then analyzes whether its strategy is reasonable according to historical facts.The first chapter mainly introduces the historical situation and relations between Byzantine and Persia from the end of the 4th century to the beginning of the 6th century before Justinian ascended the throne.Through the analysis of historical facts,this chapter summarizes the advantageous foundation that the former rulers of the Byzantine Empire laid for Justinian to develop the strategy against Persia,and points out the origin of the Persian threat faced by Justinian.The second chapter focuses on the strategy of The Byzantine Empire towards Persia in Justinian period,which is mainly divided into five sections.The first section,following the first chapter,further introduces the political,economic and military construction of The Byzantine Empire in the early days of Justinian’s reign,so as to point out that Justinian had the basic national power to formulate a strategy against Persia.The second section discusses Justinian’s ruling goal and analyzes his motivation in formulating Persian strategy.The third section discusses Justinian’s military strategy towards Persia.Firstly,it introduces the changes of the Roman-Byzantine army’s military ideas since The emperor Constantine.Secondly,it introduces the shortage of soldiers in Justinian’s time due to the lack of funds and the great demand for western military operations,and summarizes the necessity of Justinian’s strategy of defense in depth in his military actions against Persia.Finally,taking the war between Byzantium and Persia in 527-532 as an example,analyzes Byzantine’s specific use of this military strategy and points out its advantages and disadvantages.The fourth section discusses Justinian’s economic strategy towards Persia.Firstly,by introducing the high state expenditure of Justinian’s reign,it points out Justinian’s necessity to break the Persian trade monopoly and make profits from the eastern trade by opening up new trade routes.Then by introducing the geographical and political situation of the Black Sea and the Red Sea respectively,it discusses the rationality of Justinian’s choice to open up new trade routes from these two directions.Finally,it introduces the process of opening up new trade routes and summarizes Justinian’s failure and influence of this economic strategy.The fifth section discusses Justinian’s diplomatic strategy towards Persia.Firstly,discusses the rationality of Justinian’s diplomatic strategy of drawing in regional states to oppose Persia by looking back on the example of the Ancient Roman Republic.Secondly,introduces the process of Justinian’s anti-Persian alliance in Arabian Peninsula as a typical example,analyzes the influence of the Justinian’s Persian diplomatic strategy in combination with Justinian’s diplomatic activities Caucasus region which described before.The third chapter mainly discusses the influence of Justinian’s strategy towards Persia,which is divided into three sections.The first section discusses on the influence of the Byzantine empire itself.Despite the Justinian’s policy is and try to maintain peace in the east,but he still fight for the local interest and persistent hostile to Persia,cause his country was besieged on both sides.At the same time also cause the eastern provinces,which was regarded as the base area eventually ruined by the war.This country’s optimistic finances have also been badly depleted during this period.The second section discusses the influence on the Sassanian Persian empire.Although through the failure of Justinian’s Persian strategy,Sassanian Persian obtain a large amount of wealth by the treaties and ransom,but it’s still only a short-term benefits.Persians waste these wealth snatch out from the Byzantine empire in other directions of their country.On the other hand,both country failed to fundamentally solve their interest disputes until the end of the Justinian era,resulting in the continuation of the hostile competition,which laid the groundwork for the total war completely out of control between the two countries in the 7th century.The third section discusses the influence on neighboring countries.Due to the size of Byzantine and Persia as regional powers,from East Africa to The Arabian Peninsula,from the Mesopotamia to the Caucasus,variety of countries were involved in the game between these two powers.On the one hand,the failure of Justinian’s Persian strategy,led to the decline of some countries,on the other hand,indirectly promoted the unity of the Arabians,and provided them an opportunity to rise in the latter centuries.Finally,the conclusion is drawn that during Justinian’s era,Byzantine was weak and Persia was strong,were the long-term trend of the game between these two countries.Therefore,Byzantium had a clear tone of taking the defensive position and maintaining peace with Persia.But on the other hand,Justinian was not willing to reallocate the interests based on the strength of both powers in the East.Instead,he frequently made competitive and hostile actions because of his temporary greed,which led to frequent border wars with Persia and his strategies became ineffective.The conflicts of interests and contradictions between the two powers continued to worsen.In the subsequent century of conflicts,the hegemony of the two powers declined with the uncontrollable total war,resulting in the impact of the rise of the Arab and the destruction of each other.