Whenever you hear the name Alexander the Great you think of Greek history and his amazing accomplishments, which includes taking over Persia. The question is, was Alexander (We’ll call him Alexander for now until we determine who he was) actually great, or was he just the average ruler trying to take over everything by force? I always think of all the amazing things he’s done, sure, but just think all of the DAMAGE that he also caused! Hundreds of thousands of people died rebelling against him. If a city refused to surrender to him, he either killed them or sold them as slaves, but if they surrendered, he forgave them and rewarded them. Was he justifiable in his actions?
According to The Campaign of Alexander by Lucius Flavius, Alexander was on the border of India, trying to get across the Hydaspes river, but Porus was in the way. He was stopping Alexander from getting across. He turned the elephants against his troops by panicing them so that they stepped on the enemies instead of them. This shows that Alexander had some good tactics from a military standpoint, but was ruthless in conquering the ancient world.
He did anything and everything to get what he wanted.
Also, according to The Legend of the Hat Band, Alexander lost his hat while sailing a trireme (huge galley boat). It was found stuck in a clump of reeds near the shore by a sailor. He immediately went to King Alexander and returned the hat, and got rewarded more than 10,000 dollars in rewards, and as a bonus he got decapitated! Alexander was told by prophets that “he who wore the royal crown must not be made safe.”, so he made sure of that.
Alexander did have some extraordinary feats, but what was the cost? He killed more than 100,000 people just for his own benefit. His greediness far outweighed the amount of kindness he showed. I believe that Alexander the Average was just like any other ruler: power hungry and not caring for others. He killed many people just trying to gain more land and more power. King Alexander was not justifiable in his actions because he only showed he understood his own people, even then under rare circumstances. He was constantly conquering others and it was only in his interest to do this.
Source: Lucius Flavius Arrianus, The Campaigns of Alexander, circa 130 CE.
