Babylonian Dreams: Comparing the achievements of ancient Greece and Mesopotamia

I've come across this argument before and it fails to make sense. What the author calls the ancient Greeks and Romans were the tribes that managed to appear in the power vacuum left behind by what we now call "the sea peoples." I think that they were more appropriately called "the city burners" as they engaged in a multigenerational war to destroy every city (several more than once), and to kill off everyone who could read or write. There were only 2 cities that survived: Memphis and Thebes. The Egyptians mentioned that the war lasted about 30 years on their front, and weakened the Egyptian empire to the point where it was later conquered from the south.

If it were not for this pol-pot-like elimination of all civilizations, then there would not have been any chance for the greeks and romans to be more than minor tribes. But you don't learn that in school. Western history starts several hundred years later, pretending that the bronze age didn't exist except as myths of gods and giants.

Of the cities destroyed, you've probably only heard of Troy among the 45+ cities that were wiped out. Even the cities in what is now called Greece were totally forgotten. And the name for the wiped out civilization is called "pre-mycenean" after the name of a city built near the ruins of a now nameless city that was destroyed by the city burners.

http://www.amazon.com/End-Bronze-Age-Robert-Drews/dp/0691025...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_Peoples

What sort of anger would draw people from regions as distant as what we now call the Baltic and Afganistan to engage in a war that lasted longer than most people's lifespan?