Reflection on Napoleon: A Life by Andrew Roberts

               I’m not sure what compelled me to read this book at first. I think I just wanted to know what kind of guy Napoleon was since there’s so much controversy over his legacy. I felt like it was dry and tough to get through at points. There was way too much military history for me about battles’ tactics that really don’t seem to matter. I just do not care about Ney’s movements at Waterloo and how Napoleon won Marengo. However, the book was good at getting at Napoleon’s personal life and his politics. I think being him would have been exhausting. He spent almost the entirety of his reign over France at war with one power or another and lost in the end, so that’s not a great legacy. And why did he do it all? Pure self-aggrandizement. There was no plan for changing the world, he just wanted to rule it. He reminds me of a more military minded Littlefinger from Game of Thrones. I don’t understand why someone feels the need to be so important that they would literally kill thousands to get there but maybe that’s because I’m not Napoleon.

Why is Napoleon important?

               Napoleon shaped the world we live in today by conquering continental Europe and spreading many of the values of the French Revolution to states that were already and continued to be very influential. He conquered the most influential countries in the most powerful continent of the 19^th century. Some of the effects he had included the independence of nearly all of Spain’s colonies such as Mexico, Peru, Argentina, and Colombia due to the fact that he conquered Spain and deposed the monarchy. He also destroyed the Holy Roman Empire and united much of Germany, setting the stage for the eventual coalescing of Germany into one single state. However these accomplishments are more incidental than some others, and I’ll explain some of the big results of his life on the military, the economy, and politics.

               Napoleon’s greatest military innovation was the corps system. The corps is a group of tens of thousands of soldiers, bigger than a division but smaller than an army, that Napoleon made completely self-sufficient with infantry, cavalry, and artillery. He would conquer large swathes of Europe by fanning out his corps, and then, at the perfect moment (which is easier said than done), he would collapse them back into a single army to penetrate a weak spot in the enemy’s lines. Napoleon often left tactics to his marshals, but he was a genius when it came to bigger, operational movements. His corps system made him much more agile than his opponents, and once they realized this, the states of Europe adopted the system themselves by 1812 and would use it until 1945.

               Napoleon’s downfall was primarily economic. The author writes that, “At the end of his reign, France has reached only the level of industrialization that Britain had enjoyed in 1780, an indictment of revolutionary, Directory and Napoleonic economic policy and the Colbertism they all followed.” While Napoleon conquered Europe, Great Britain held him in a sea blockade, forcing him to trade through the continent. He attempted to form the “Continental System” to send a blockade right back to Britain, but it hurt his allies and supporters, weakening him further. It made alliance with Russia impossible, leading to his failed invasion and it hurt the French middle-class, who had been his biggest supporters. France also saw its customs revenues drop 80% from 1806-1809 and during the Napoleonic era, British currency depreciated, making exports even cheaper to the continent. Economically, the Napoleonic years in France put the nail in the coffin for a global French empire, as France lost Haiti and sold the Louisiana Purchase while getting boxed in by a stronger and faster growing British economy. France fell far behind.

               Politically, Napoleon spread the ideals of the French Revolution to the rest of Europe, establishing constitutions in the places he conquered and promoting meritocracies that eliminated the old feudal ways in much of Northern Italy, Germany, Poland, and other parts of Europe where his armies went. Ironically, he was probably most responsible for ending much of the liberalism of the French Revolution, as he reintroduced the Church, much of the nobility, and hated taxes from the days of Louis XVI. The most egregious is that he made himself emperor and started marrying off his family members to the houses of Europe. While he partially reconstituted the old monarchy, I feel like Napoleon is a sort of proto-fascist in the way that he micromanaged and had total, personal control over the government, in the way that his support came mainly from middle-class managers and store owners who he protected with tariffs, and in the way that his success was largely based on the military and social conservatism in many ways with large amounts of censorship. He set the stage for future authoritarianism based on the cult of personality. I should also mention that his Napoleonic code is the basis of the modern French law system and forms a component of the law systems of many other European countries.

What was Napoleon like on a personal level?

               From the very beginning, he was extremely ambitious. It helped to be born into a wealthy and somewhat influential Corsican family. He never worked for anyone but himself. During the revolution he pretended to be sick to avoid anything he didn’t want to do and finally made himself useful as a captain of artillery in the south of France and as a crusher of revolt in Paris. He read a lot about Alexander and Caesar and dreamt of putting his name in the history books like them as great conquerors. I wish that Napoleon had had better role models. His ambition was really strong and it’s a shame he wasn’t born in a time where his role model could have been Martin Luther King Jr. or Gandhi. The only ideal he ever believed in besides himself as a young person was Corsican nationalism, resenting that the French had control of his island.

               Napoleon also liked to joke around and developed good rapport with his troops. He kind of seems like the anti-George Washington in many ways. While Washington was serious and even dour, Napoleon was lighthearted and loved jokes. While Washington was understated, Napoleon was a megalomaniac. While Washington gave up power and didn’t enjoy having it, it was like breathing for Napoleon- he absolutely needed it to live.

               He was extremely sexist and never saw women as even close to equals. He frequently made comments referring to women as only good for breeding and he never really fell in love, admitting at the end of his life in exile at St. Helena that he had only ever felt love for his first wife Josephine, but just a little. He frequently paired off his family members to royal houses and viewed marriage through a political lens, eventually divorcing his wife Josephine for the young princess of Austria. He had a weak spot for his family; even though he was very meritocratic in all things, he made an exception to marry his sisters to princes and to make his brothers kings of European states.

               He had a style of conversation that was very direct with people. He would ask questions rapid-fire and try to learn all he could about a subject. He was not afraid of admitting ignorance and many commented that he was unafraid to ask questions that showed that he was completely uninformed, likely because he was sure that he could learn it quickly; he would consistently be right about that. This reminds me a lot of Bill Belichick, who prefers to let the other person do the talking so that he can soak up all the knowledge possible. Napoleon was also a micromanager, constantly sending letters to manage the empire that depended on his person alone. He would go so far as to judge disputes between stagecoach drivers in Italy or theater performers in France while he was campaigning in Germany, Russia, or Poland.

Conclusion

               I would say that France’s and Napoleon’s biggest mistake was invading Europe and not Asia or Africa. While Britain built a strong navy that would last another hundred years as the dominant military force and keep Great Britain as the dominant country, France tried to take over Europe, and failed despite initial successes. Europe was just too strong at the time for any one country to dominate the continent so easily. Even today, such a task would be incredibly difficult. This book was somewhat interesting, but Napoleon’s life was more or less what I expected. An ambitious megalomaniac tries to take over the world and nearly does it, twice. It’s really just a good story about an absolutely crazy guy that would make a very good miniseries filled with drama and betrayal. His story features the highest ecstasy and the lowest most depressing pain at different points, ending with the slow boredom of his last years on St. Helena, where he wrote his memoirs and discussed all the things he did right and wrong with the visitors he received on that remote island. It was an interesting life.

Miscellaneous Facts:

• Napoleon’s record in battle was 53-7, putting him up there in contention for one of the best ever.
• When Napoleon’s sea invasion of Britain was defeated at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, his censorship was so complete that the French didn’t hear about the disaster until 1814.
• Napoleon cooperated with Spain’s Prime Minister Don Manuel de Godoy y Alvarez to invade the country. This guy was some character. Godoy had both his wife and mistress living in the same house, but was also a lover of the queen, and the king was so compliant that when Godoy intercepted a letter warning the king of his cuckolding, he simply passed it on.
• When King Ferdinand of Spain was in captivity, held by Napoleon, he had Stockholm Syndrome and write to Napoleon to congratulate him about a French victory over Spanish forces and then tried to solicit a royal marriage.
• Napoleon’s invasion of Russia was multi-national, involving Poles, Germans, Muslims, and other groups, with French as the largest group, but not a majority.
• Lionel de Rothschild had to be elected three times to the House of Commons before he could take his seat for the constituency of the City of London as the first practicing Jewish MP in 1858.
• The Battle of Borodino was the bloodiest single day in the history of warfare until the first battle of the Marne over a century later.
• Napoleon crossed a river in his Russian retreat at a town called “Studzianka,” which means “very very cold” in Byelorussian.
• Napoleon almost always lied about his battles, exaggerating his victories and downplaying his defeats.