Ashurbanipal
 

Ashurbanipal became king of Assyria in 669 B.C. His father Esarhaddon had died while leading an army to Egypt. Ashurbanipal's brother Shamash-shum-ukin was made ruler of Babylonia. Throughout nearly all of Ashurbanipal's reign, Assyria was at war.
The first military action of Ashurbanipal was the reconquest of Egypt. Ashurbanipal defeated the army of Tirhakah, but could not capture him. Tirhakah was quite elusive and Ashurbanipal, like his father Esarhaddon, became well aware of it. Asurbanipal had 12 governors appointed in Egypt, thinking that this division of authority would prevent further revolts. His reasoning turned out to be wrong. In 664 B.C. one of the Egyptian officials named Psamtik declared himself to be sole governor. He had recruited Greek and Carian mercenaries to create his own personal army. These troops expelled the Assyrian soldiers from Egypt. This time Ashurbanipal did not try to regain control of Egypt. He had enough problems elsewhere.
In the eastern part of the Assyrian empire, Shamash-shum-ukin had decided to revolt and make Babylonia independent. Ashurbanipal went to war against his brother. That war lasted three years, from 651 B.C. to 648 B.C. In the final part of it, Ashurbanipal laid siege to Babylon. The city fell and Shamash-shum-ukin committed suicide. He set his own palace on fire to do it.
Ashurbanipal had a war with Arabian tribes, which he won. Then he engaged in a major war with Elam. That conflict lasted for ten years. Ashurbanipal won the last great battle in 639 B.C. His army thoroughly ravaged Elam, including the capital city of Susa.
When Ashurbanipal returned to Nineveh in triumph, it looked as if things were good for Assyria. But in reality Assyria was seriously weakened. Constant fighting had bled the kingdom of much revenue. The biggest problem was now sources of revenue. Ashurbanipal had so completely ravaged Elam that there was hardly anything left of it to exploit economically.
Egypt was now independent and Assyria was not going to regain it. For one thing, the Assyrian army was exhausted from so much fighting and lacked the enthusiasm for another war.
Assyria still had control of Phoenicia and it was intact. But Phoenicia could not provide much revenue for the Assyrians. The reason was that the Phoenician merchants were losing commerce, due to competition from Greek traders.
In the southern part of the Assyrian empire, some Scythians made a march that netted a lot of plunder. They got as far as Israel and the only reason they stopped was that Egypt offered them a considerable bribe.
Ashurbanipal died in 627 B.C. Things went badly for Assyria after that. Ashurbanipal's successors had inherited a huge mess that he had made. It was too much to repair. Assyria would soon collapse.

Neal Robbins