Why Napoleon Was One of the Best Generals in History

Everybody knows the name, most people know that he was a conqueror, but fewer people know the whole story. This article will introduce you to Napoleon, his wars and his impossible achievements. Born a barely French lower class noble, Napoleon was sent to an artillery school at a young age. Many years later after the French revolution he could make quick promotions in the French army because his origin wasn't a problem anymore and the noble officers were all gone. But his real break came when royalist tried to restore the monarchy, while the revolutionary forces were greatly outnumbered in Paris. All officers senior to Napoleon either deserted or weren't present and Napoleon assumed command of the army to defend the politicians superior to him. He did this successfully and was promoted to a general post nobody else wanted.

He got the command over the almost defeated army of Italy. His objective was to prevent Austria from attacking France through Italy. Half a year later Napoleon had turned the war around and he was marching on the Austrian capital. Austria made a peace treaty and gave Italy and Belgium too France in exchange for peace. This not only saved the revolutionary government, but also made Paris the wealthiest city of Europe and made Napoleon incredibly popular.

The revolutionary government felt threatened by Napoleon and to get rid of him they sent him on a new impossible mission. This time he had to conquer Great Britain. He refused because it was impossible and came with the idea to conquer Egypt instead, to block Britain's trade route too India. His political enemies agreed, because they obviously liked the idea of having Napoleon far away.

While Napoleon was conquering Egypt and marching his army north into the Middle East and even beating the Turks, France lost all territory Napoleon had gained in Europe. Paris was losing its riches, and all of France was convinced that they needed Napoleon back in France. Napoleon returned and could make himself dictator with a coup. He showed Austria who was the boss, and won the lost territory back. He now gave the French people the opportunity to make him their Emperor for life with a referendum. The answer was yes, and he crowned himself Emperor of France, placing the crown on his own head. So, now a lower class noble had made it too emperor of France.

France was still in war with Great Britain, because the English were scared of the French revolutionary ideas and thought it could threaten their monarchy. Napoleon planned the invasion of Britain, but found out Britain had sponsored Austria and Russia too attack him from the east. He turned his whole army around and with the fastest march in history he had his army in the middle of Austria before the Austrians and Russians had joined forces together. He beat an Austrian army, conquered Austria's capital Vienna and moved deeper into the Austrian empire. Here at last he met the Russian army together with a new Austrian army. Greatly outnumbered he won his most famous victory, the battle of Austerlitz.

From there on Napoleon conquered all of Europe until the Russian border. After beating the Russian army he forced them into an alliance against Great Britain. As ruler of Europe he introduced his code Napoleon, a new law book which greatly improved the management of his empire. This code is too this day the foundation of most of the laws in Europe. A few years later trouble came up, when England invaded his empire through Spain while Austria had gathered new armies too win their land back from the east. Napoleon attacked from two sides managed to win this war, but the costs were very high. Too prevent this from happening again he married the daughter of the Austrian Emperor.

He was stronger than ever before, because the threat from Austria was gone. He could focus on Russia now because they weren't honoring the forced alliance. Napoleon for the first time in his career outnumbering his enemy marched with the biggest army ever assembled into Russia. But the Russians weren't going to fight this great army with its even greater general. They retreated deeper and deeper into Russia, burning everything on their way back to make sure Napoleon didn't have supplies. Napoleon took Moscow with a hungry army, and the Russians with no major city left started to negotiate their surrender. But they didn't agree on details and it lasted for weeks until Napoleon saw that they weren't negotiating, but wasting his time to have the winter finish him. Just on time he started his retreat, but he had bad luck, the Russian winter was earlier and worse than normal that year. And his huge unbeatable army froze to death in the Russian winter.

Napoleon survived the weather and with only a few thousand men he reached Paris. Yet France had no more men too draft into the army, and all of Eastern Europe including Austria joined forces together against him. Greatly outnumbered he was winning battles, but his army got smaller after each battle. And eventually he was captured and send too an isle just a few hundred km's south of France. France got its king back, but the population wasn't happy about this and Napoleon managed to escape from his prison isle. He landed in France as a hero and local authorities acknowledged him as their leader again. The new king sent an army, but that army turned sides when they saw the former French emperor. And yet again, Napoleon was ruler of France.

The rest of Europe joined forces together again, even England participated this time. They sent their best general the Duke of Wellington and for the first time in his career Napoleon decisively lost a battle. He was captured again, and sent to an isle in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. And at last, his great career was over.

Find a list of the top 10 generals in history at http://www.themindbehind.net go to history and there you will find the link too the top 10 generals list at the bottom of the page.

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Article written by: Dennis Wagenaar

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