He was also good at logistics (“An army travels on its stomach” and all that). But that’s still not the same as being a good strategist.
Its what Bugs Bunny used in his battles against Napoleon. Don’t knock it.
Grand strategy, is a usual term - Grand strategy - Wikipedia
Napoleon’s longevity in power was likely, in part, due to the fact that the Army loved him. The Little Corporal was adored by the rank and file.
Or he could have just read Sun Tzu.
Or Tacitus or several others.
Notwithstanding Sun Tsu’s great reknown, Chinese commanders are not historically known as a group for their great skill in deploying armies. Oh, there were many good ones. There were just many, many more bad ones. The practice of too many dynasties of using wholly inexperienced bureacrats may have been an issue, though some of them proved quite capable.
But more to the point, Sun Tzu really gave no practical advice. His book is full of theory or abstract instructions but very short on how to actually do things, except in overly-specific concepts. Sun Tzu would rarely advocate splitting an army; armies of his day did not normally require it. By Napoleon’s time this was often not possible. And some of Sun Tzu’s advice takes as a given that the troops are half-trained, non-professional soldiers, of unreliable loyalty and courage.
In order to be fair to the Master, the written version we have is not wholly complete and was partly a guide to an oral tradition, which we don’t have.
As I wrote, Napoleon didn’t invent any of these ideas. But he was the first to systematically apply them in an actual war.
I don’t agree. Sun Tzu gives in-depth commentary on every subject in Little Nemo’s list.
Sun Tzu may have given some relatively detailed advice but it wasn’t stuff Napoleon could have used. Here’s Sun Tzu on logistics:
That was probably a handy rule of thumb back in the sixth century BC but I’m guessing Napoleon wasn’t looking for information on how much it cost to keep chariots in the field.
If Napoleon had not been gifted for politics, he wouldn’t have become emperor. He arguably wouldn’t even have survived the revolution.
Someone said “administration”, but actually Napoleon as also an excellent administrator. Most french structures (admnistration, law, education, etc…) have been set up by him and are still in place, even though they have evolved.
An excellent point, I think.
I would add that Napoleon was also very well served. The french revolution produced a lot of exceptionnal characters, both by giving them a shot at proving themselves and in a sort of “survival of the fittest” way.
This applied both to the military (the so-called “20 y.o. generals” like himself and the less well known Hoche, Marceau or Kleber, his marshals like Murat or Ney, and his rivals like Moreau that some believe to have been a better general than Napoleon) and to the administrators and political critters (like his infamous foreign minister Talleyrand, who managed to acquire and keep a high political position under all the french regimes, the republic, the empire, the monarchic restoration, and might have been both the best and most corrupt politician France ever had, the almost equally infamous minister of police Fouché, the head of his secret police Vidocq, etc…).
Many of these people were granted an opportunity they would never have had in other circumstances (Bonaparte was a lowly lieutnant, Hoche a horse-keeper, Murat a cavalry sergeant, Vidocq a convicted felon, etc…) and they had to be savy enough to survive (not solely politically but even physically) throught the turmoils of the revolution and the empire.
Napoleon most certainly benefited from this pool of highly talented individuals and knew how to put at his service those he could use and neutralize those who could chalenge his power.
I would finally say that someone who had to achieve supreme power and then keep it against all sort of ennemies (republicans, monarchists, power-grabbers like him) and all sort of plots, reorganize almost from scrach the institutions of a highly agitated, distraught and bankrupt country, deal with a large numbers of countries, political entities and people (from small german states through popular italian organizations to the Russian empire) and succesfully lead in battle armies much larger than Europe had ever known, all at the same time, had to be some sort of genius, in one way or another.
Yes, but it proves that he wasn’t the first person to think about such things, which is the point I was trying to make.
Neither was Sun Tzu. The first person who thought about it was probably Thragg, son of Gard, who first led a force of 300 cavemen across 25 miles to fight their enemies, the vicious Gnock tribe.
No one said Napoleon was the first man to think about thse things. Or even the first man in Europe. Or even the first man in France. But he did develop principles of war and adapted practice to his time and place. Which is what Sun Tzu did.
OK, one more post about this and then I’ll shut up. The first translation of Sun Tzu into a western language was published in French in 1772 by J.J.M. Amiot, and reprinted in 1782. My edition of Sun Tzu states:
So it’s entirely possible that Napolean read Sun Tzu and thought, “This guy talks about things that we’ve never paid much attention to before. Maybe we should take logistics, intelligence, communication and organization more seriously.”
I’ve read Sun Tzu in multiple translations. He doesn’t actually mention much about logistics, intelligence (well, he does have a section on outright spying), communication or organization. Almost all of that is assumed and is in there but mostly in a background fashion. Sun Tzu wrote about how to outhink your enemy and outmanuever him, and considered fighting battles a waste (in which he was realistically wrong). THAT may have had an effect on 'Ole Nappy, as fighting over strategic poitns was a huge element of his strategy.
And who’s arguing with you?
As I’ve been saying, Napoleon didn’t invent these ideas. But he actually put them into practice at a time when other generals didn’t.
Look that was a good point but just lay off of us Gnockians O.K.?
You never ever let an opportunity to slag us off go past do you?
The past is the past so why dont you just let it drop.
Its not as though you Thraggians are saints exactly,bloody hypocrites more like.