Actually, their battle plan relied on discipline—keeping the phalanx intact and moving into close quarters with their short stabbing swords.
This tactic usually worked well against undisciplined barbarians. But I wonder how the discipline would hold when several rows of the phalanx were taken out with one shot from a mile away by a Barret .50?
You’re confusing the Romans with the Greeks. The Romans didn’t use the phalanx. the Greeks [and later the Macedonians] did. The Romans used the triplex acies and the maniuplar/cohort formation [much more maneuverability]. and before the gladii came out, they softened you up with the pilae [javelins].
The difference? Cynochepalis, where the Romans destroyed the phalanx army of Philip VI of Macedon, and acquired Greece.
I didn’t read the story, so I don’t know where the MEU starts off at Rome itself or far away in a province. My only point is that the Romans lost over and over again. Traditionally, and among eastern peoples including the Greeks, you’d simply surrender not wanting to endure more pain and incur more losses. The Romans didn’t do that. They put together another army and kept fighting.
The moral to the material is as 3 to 1. Being ‘game’ often wins the day.