HistWar
HistWar (English zone) => History & Tactics => Discussion démarrée par: AJ le 16 mars 2010, 19:44:33 pm
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Ah, I knew that would get your attention!!! I have been playing with my Google toolbar Translator and have been reading a massive thread in the French Zone (7 pages). Our dear French friends (and no offence to my French friends reading this) are positively at each others throats about who was to blame for the defeat at Waterloo.
It's well worth reading and well worth starting a discussion here too. I have learned a lot reading their thoughts on the subject.
I don't really think they've got over it yet :lol: :lol: :lol:
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Incidentally for those with a translator, this is the link to their thread
http://www.histwar.org/forum/index.php/topic,2945.0.html
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I have been following it as well, as best I can with my limited French, but I do not dare interfere. You are a brave man, AJLB.
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Foolhardy more like, my dear Uxbridge. I have just suggested to them that they have never got over it and are determined to start another Civil War amongst themselves. The Fox is in the Chicken Coop now :oops: :oops: :oops: :oops:
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With Grouchy's troops detached from the main army I think the campaign was as good as lost by the time it got to Waterloo anyway, the french needed a much more decisive victory at either Ligny or Quatre Bras to badly maul at least one of the allied armies and to stop them from linking up. If D'Erlons corps had arrived at Ligny on Zeithen's flank instead of being marched between there and quatre bras all day it might have resulted in a decisive victory against blucher and no help for Wellington.
Detatching Grouchy's troops was pretty pointless in my opinion as they were exhausted from the fighting at Ligny and in no condition to persue blucher.
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Ah Smoke (he's still pissed about Keagan), that is a strategic point of view, to which I myself concur, but what say you of the tactical situation on the field in question?
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Despite the strategic situation there were opportunities for the French to win the battle on the day, despite Wellington having the advantage of a reverse slope the various farm buildings, chateaus and the mud.
D’Erlons attack almost succeeded as it was directed against the weakest part of Wellington’s line.
Even Ney’s cavalry attack could’ve been turned into a costly success if infantry and more artillery had advanced close behind to support it, as it put most of Wellington’s artillery temporarily out of action.
I think most for the defeat lies with Napoleon, for not committing enough reserves in the right places, and for detaching Grouchy. The wasteful attacks on Hougoumont should never have been allowed to consume the amount of reverses they did. Artillery should have been sent there to make breaches in the walls. Overall I think a brigade would have been sufficient to keep the defenders pinned down rather than the 14,000 men eventually committed to the assault.
That would leave more men to strengthen D’ Erlon’s attack, outflanking the ridge wouldn’t have been practical because of the small villages and streams on the left and Hougoumont on the right. I think the only chance the French had to win was by breaking through on the right.
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AJ, as Uxbridge said you are indeed a brave soul to get embroiled in a French discussion on who was to blame for the loss of the battle.
I think it’s fair to say that the Battle of Waterloo has been written about, discussed at length and argued over more than any other battle in history.
I decided many years ago to avoid meaningful discussions about the battle as the outcome of these often heated exchanges led nowhere.
What I have always wondered, if Wellington’s army had broken and retreated towards the coast, would Blucher have continued his advance on Napoleons right flank?
But that’s just another hypothetical question! :D
Anyway good luck in your endeavour, I’ll be following your posts with interest.
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I don't think one army would've continued to attack if the other had been destroyed, Blucher would probably have withdrawn and awaited the arrival of the russians or austrians.
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Later today I will try and post a summary of the thoughts of our French friends. There are issues I have never considered
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Well Gentlemen, I started this little topic off, so I’d better weigh in. As I said earlier, I have been watching the posts of our French brothers in arms on this topic. It is curious to observe how passionate they are on this subject, I get the impression they are still trying to find one person to blame and most (not all) refuse to lay the blame on the Emperors doorstep.
I am presenting to you a synopsis of their arguments, which are quite enlightening. They fall into 2 areas, Strategic and Tactical. I know I will miss a lot of their points, I apologize in advance.
STRATEGIC
Some feel that Napoleons strategy was to defeat both Wellington and Blucher then sue for peace with the Austrians and Russians. Others, that he meant to separate Wellington and Blucher, defeat Wellington soundly, hoping that Blucher had no stomach to fight on, and then seek peace. I feel that the latter hypothesis holds no water. He attacked Blucher at Ligny first, surely with the intention of destroying him there; he didn’t achieve as complete a victory as he wished and learning of the affair at Quatre Bras, he leaves the inept Grouchy to chase Blucher while he himself goes to deal with Wellington. In fairness to Grouchy, our French friends point out that Grouchy’s troops were tired and in no state to effectively pursue. Here the Grand Strategy is already unraveling.
From a strategic point of view, they raised another very interesting argument. Why leave your most able General in Paris raising an Army. As I learned, Davout was given this task. He who could snatch victories so brilliantly, was made head of the recruiting office, leaving Ney and Grouchy to command his wings. Did the Emperor harbor suspicions as to Davout’s loyalty? Many of our French friends feel that from both a Strategic and a Tactical point of view, Davouts omission as Chief of Staff, in favor of Soult, was the first and possibly the gravest mistake of the campaign.
TACTICAL
So much has been written on the tactical aspects of Waterloo that I couldn’t hope to cover all of them here. I will endeavor however to convey the main points of our Gallic friends.
Soult was past his best and had already been bested by Wellington in the Peninsula campaign, Wellington therefore had a psychological advantage over him from the outset. Some of our friends cannot understand why 15,000 French troops, that D’Erlon could have sorely used in his assault, were employed against Hougemont, when a Brigade could have pinned down the defenders with ease. The old one, of brave Ney’s lack of use of combined arms in his cavalry assault, even evokes anger amongst them. What of Wellingtons left they say, why wasn’t a determined attempt to turn it, made. This has puzzled me for years, surely if Blucher were to join Wellington, it would be on the left flank, Napoleons right and rear. The same combined arms argument comes up with the assault of the Old Guard. Others argue vehemently that the battle was lost due to ineffective preparatory Artillery bombardments and that Napoleon as an artillery man, should have known the cannon balls would not bounce off the muddy fields.
Little credit is given to the generalship of Wellington or the manner in which his army stood their ground. It is almost as though Wellington was there to be had and the failure to do so was entirely due to French mistakes.
CONCLUSION
The following are my thoughts on the subject, not those of our friends.
Whatever the cause of the Emperors demise at Waterloo, I feel there is no one action that caused it. Rather it was a combination of errors, both Strategic and Tactical, which compounded in a domino effect. If I was backed into a corner to give just 2 reasons, I would say “Davout & Wellington”. The absence of the former and the presence of the latter, contributed to all that went wrong for the French and went right for the Allies.
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Hello,
I am french but pretty good in english I hope!
About Davout, I read that he was not only a great general, but also a great trainer and administrator, Napoleon thought it would be easy to beat the prussian and allies, and therefore it was better to keep Davout organising the army for the next fight...
Napoleon made some wrong choice in terms of HR management, putting Soult as CoS was dumb, Soult having no experience in that. He appointed Ney almost the day the campaign started and therefor did not really know what his purpose was. He also left out Murat who was ready to come back and who would have made the same mistakes as Ney against the english squares...
Then I corps not fighting in Ligny was certainly a blow because the prussian army was not destroyed and Napoleon thought wrongly that it would not be able to fight another day. Then bad luck struck, Blucher survived the battle by a thread and was instrumental in bringing the prussians to the help of Wellington at Waterloo. Gneisenau was very suspicious of Wellington and it was likeky that he would not have helped Wellington, and I think most of us agree that Wellington on its own would not have beaten Napoleon.
Then on the 17th almost nothing happened, and that was another mistake, third mistake, Grouchy did not locate properly the prussians and was therefore not able on the 18th to stop Blucher...
Now on the 18th the french were as dumb as the computer AI in total war: they sent half a corps to try to get into a farm, launched a cavalry attack with no artillery support and then did it again with the guard...
It is a pity to see that a very good campaign plan, went completely wrong because of bad casting, bad luck and beginner's mistakes...
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Marbot...what a wonderful and elaborate answer..
I didn't bother answering to this topic so far...firstly because I think it has been done over for ages - secondly because whole libraries have been written on it...and thirdly and most important of all because I think that it might lead to a duel between the two parties here on the forum eventually...
So far I'm impressed that noone tried to stir up the other - at least not in the English section... ;) - I really hope it stays that way :!:
Thanks again for your answer Marbot :!: :mrgreen: :mrgreen:
CvC
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i think Ney charge was a waste of material and talent!!! loosing that much cavalry made things easier for the Prussians too,,,
bad timing,, maybe he was drunk...
Flea.
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My dear Count, It was never my intention to start up a duel between the parties involved, we are now all friends and Comrades in Arms. In our nbc clan I myself proudly fight as a French CinC. I also post over in the French Zone and I am meeting many new friends there.
I agree Waterloo has been "done to death", however for many of us there remains a fascination. The thoughts and opinions brought to the table by our friends "over there", add an invaluable insight into the whole affair. For instance I have learned that there is a faction who feel that the "Original Orders" used by many as the basis for their particular arguments, are indeed forgeries.
Marbot, thank you for your insightful contribution to our discussion, I know the subject has stirred up a lot of passion in your Zone.
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And Flea, I believe, is a Frenchman!!!!!
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Yes, I think our French colleagues are certainly biased. If Napoleon's defeat has nothing to do with Wellington and
the British, then why was Bluecher's Prussian so soundly defeated in Ligny? With Wellington's brilliant track record in
Spain, he is with little doubt the best defensive general of the time. Even if Prussian did not arrive, it is quite likely
the battle will end in a stalemate. Why? Because even Napoleon's ultimate weapon, the Old Guard, could not break
the Brits.
I guess with my pseudonym, you are justified to think I am biased too ;)
Welly
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My last post was a bit muddled. What I am saying is that it is the same French Army and generals that defeated the Prussians
at Ligny and lost to Wellington and the Anglo-Dutch Army. You must ask yourselves is if Blucher was in Wellington's
shoes, would he have held? Anglo-Dutch Army is very uneven and was of lower quality than the French on average. It was
really Wellington's choice of ground, deployment, coolness, judgment that made the difference. For example, how he did
not lose his head over Hougomont and La Haye Sainte but judiciously and calmly reinforced and redeployed that broke
all the French attacks.
Like I said, even if the Prussian did not arrived. The French has already shot the bolt and have no chance of winning.
Welly
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Of course we are all experts with hindsight. If the Prussians had not advanced toward Plancenoit, and if Napoleon had realised that they were staying put, he could have threatened Wellington's right flank. Wellington would have been seriously tempted to step right to preserve his lines to the coast. The resulting gap between the Allies might have been enough for the French advance up the hill toward Brussels to succeed, the Belgians drop out of the alliance and some sort of uneasy peace to be made, depending in turn on whether the Russians and Austrians could bring themselves to fight again.
So you have to give plenty of credit to both Wellington and Blucher for each having the courage to believe in the other, especially given Napoleon's track record against divided forces.
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Hello,
I have with all due respect to disagree wth Wellington. Wellington did indeed fight a good defensive battle as usual especially the use of farms as forward positions to break the french impetus worked very well. However there is so much you can do with what you have and I don't think his army would have hold should the prussians had decided not to help. I see two main reasons: By having to take care of the prussian threat, Napoleon diverted the whole VI Corps and during the fight most of the young guard got sucked in plancenoit, which means the only reserve left was the rest of the guard. We all know that good management of reserves is a key element in victory or defeat, by having half of its reserves committed, Napoleon had already exposed himself. We do not know what he would have done with VI Corps, but we can imagine Lobau would have supported the cavalry attacks, giving it a more combined arms outlook and therefore improving its chances of success. The second reason, is that he lost a great part of the initiative as soon as the prussians were spotted. If he wants to win he needs to avoid the 2 armies joining up, therefore he needs now to beat the allies quickly while delaying the prussians at the same time and then swing his whole army to beat the prussians, not an easy task compared to the original one of just crushing the allies, especially when the guy in front of you is good at defense... One can also imagine that with no prussian threat, the afternoon attacks would have been much better prepared, since the time constraints were gone.
Yes a lot of things have been said about this campaign, but there still seem to be many different opinions from Sibourne seeing the british being instrumental in the victory to Andrew Uffindell who sees Blücher as the one responsible to the strategic victory over Napoleon. I think as well, Napoleon in general and the Waterloo campaign in particular, have always been topics biased by the feelings you have torwards the man... But it is always nice to talk about it!
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Despite a lot of smoothness and cautiousness, I'm afraid this topic could become like the french one... :mrgreen:
More seriously, Marbot has made a very interesting contribution ;)
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For me Napoleon is the one to blame.
2 main reasons :
He has chosen the marshal Soult as "Etat major". Ok Berthier was dead but why Soult ?
He has splitted his army (he has always warned his marshals on that). For me Grouchy has followed the order and he was too far from the battlefield. He brought his corp of 30 000 men in france threw belgium full of allies.
For his defense, napoleon suffered of hemorroide and didn t check the battlefield properly.
Bad luck...
Moliere
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Ah!! I see our French friends are now joining us over here, this is exactly the type of discourse I anticipated when I started the Topic. Thilio, do not worry, our English blood runs colder than yours, we tend not to get as passionate about the subject and if it takes "smoothness and cautioness" as you put it, that is good. Self discipline and coolness under fire, are good traits.
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hahaha :mrgreen:
the English maybe....my people is quite different :mrgreen:
there is this little story of one of my countrymen back in 1809: He fought in southern Tyrol against the French...he was only armed with a scythe and killed 23! Frenchmen in close combat before he was finally silenced by 12! enemy bayonetts... :mrgreen: :mrgreen: - so much for Tyrolians keeping cool in the midst of the battle... ;)
CvC
PS: maybe this is the reason why I try to stay as objective as possible when I do a presentation on any battle at UNI...I might get into a fight with my professor I am bound to lose :twisted:
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Count, I knew there was something special about you guys
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I have to agree the threat posed by the Prussian was crucial. But my point was if it was not Wellington in command of the
Allies and there were no British contingents, I can easily see French would have come up on top on that fateful day.
Welly
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To answer Wellesley :
I m not agree with you because the arrival of the prussians had forced Napoleon to do a frontal attack. It was compulsory to break the English lines. The time was running out.
English infantry was the best in the world at that time specially in defense mode. English soldiers can shoot twice a minute.
However, It doesn't mean that the english soldiers were better that the old guard. It was la crème de la crème :) No ones even the old guard could break a line full of soldiers and cannons. Napoleon sent the old guard to encourage the rest of his army knowing that the prussians will arrive soon and that it was not grouchy who was arriving...
Wellington knew perfectly that the prussians will arrive in the back of the french army so he has smartly resisted.
A massive arrival of Prussians has changed the course of history.
M
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oh and i forgot : the weather !
Heavy rains have delayed the beginning of the battle and the cannons balls were less efficient !
M
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I think Ney needs to take a major part of the blame as well as Napoelon for failing to seize the crossroads at Quatre Bras when he had the chance to do so at relativly little cost, and also for his contradictory orders which caused d'Erlons corps to march between Quatre Bras and Ligny all day without arriving at either. Theres a pretty good article on it at Napoleon Series:
http://www.napoleon-series.org/military/battles/waterloo/c_waterlood'erlon.html (http://www.napoleon-series.org/military/battles/waterloo/c_waterlood'erlon.html)
Napoelon's overall campaign plan was perfectly sound, it was on a tactical level that it fell apart due to confusion and errors caused by his choice of subordinates. Ney or Jerome should'nt have been given command of anything, even Grouchy would have done better at Quatre Bras.
Napoelon really should've taken Davout instead of Ney, as he was the best commander he had and was good at gaining victorys over superior forces, which is exactly what Napoleon needed in his campaign. I think There was no point in making long term plans by making him war minster before the Waterloo Campaign was won.
I have to agree the threat posed by the Prussian was crucial. But my point was if it was not Wellington in command of the
Allies and there were no British contingents, I can easily see French would have come up on top on that fateful day
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Apparently the Prince of Orange was in command of all allied forces in Belgium before Wellington, if Napoleon had been in a postion to attack whilst this was still the case he might have gotten the quick victory he wanted.
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I agree with marbot concerning Davout.
Napoleon's return was not easy. He needed people that he could trust specially in Paris.
A lot of Marshalls received a lot of new titles & money with the new King and they were tired to fight.
Berthier's death (suicide? murder?) was a blow for Napoleon's head quarter.
M
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To conclude, the 1815 campain in belgium even with a french victory would have been stopped few months after with the 200 000 austrians & 150 000 russians army.
Europe was tired of Napoleon, peace was not possible even with a victory over the prussians and englishs.
So losing Waterloo saved many europeans lifes.
M
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That Moliere, is a very sound observation.
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My answer is more in response to the reported French discussion where the role of Wellington and the English in
Napoleon's defeat was neglected. There were a lot of what-if's been put forward: Davout actually has a battlefield
commission, D'Erlon did not uselessly march back and forth, Grouchy more vigorous in the pursuit, Ney not
blew the Reserved Calvary, Napoleon more energetic etc. But what if Wellington were not in command at Waterloo.
Given the quality of the Allied Army, I would say Napoleon could well have prevailed against a lesser commander.
As Moliere, many lives were spared because of the historical outcome of Waterloo and Wellington should receive
his due credit.
Welly
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Hé hé, Waterloo is a Prussian victory, Wellington is not for great things. Just a Columbia defense .... :mrgreen: ;)
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Wellington did not only fight and win defensive battles, what about Assaye, Oporto, Salamanca, Vittoria to name a few off the top of my head, :D
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True, but it was Joseph Bonaparte was in front and not Napoleon, this probably explains this
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Somehow the topic became split, it's also running in the Grenadiers forum. This is what I posted there.
Gentlemen, if you please. My unnoficial duty as the topic starter, is to summarize now and again.
From all that I have read in this Zone and everything in the French Zone, It seems that the number one reason so far is:
THE OMMISION OF DAVOUT, because most other tactical errors follow because of his ommision.
Wellington did superbly, however in my opinion he would never have had his day if Davout had been there, but if he did, he would have been soundly beaten before Blucher arrived.
Would anybody care to post, as to why this conclusion is wrong?
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Well, in my opinion, i think Wellington did the day thanks to Blucher, the battle between France and British alone was not so at a good point for United Kingdom Army.
Maybe if Davout was the one to press on Blucher maybe the result could be different, but i do not know how France could resist another Campaign in 1815 against another coalition.
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No question that Wellington was one of the finest Battlefield Generals of the Age of Napoleon.
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I'm not sure if this has been mentioned.
The French army at Waterloo was the army with the shakiest if not the worst morale that Napoleon ever led. There were even a few deserters to the allies ( including a general ) on it's way into Belgium.
How would Alexander's army have been after almost 20 years of constant war? One theory is that Alexander's generals were so tired of war they poisoned him.
So looking at it from a morale point of view, Napoleon didn't do that bad with the army. He defeated the Prussians and almost beat the English. If not for Blucher saving Wellington against advice, it's Napoleon 2 allies 0.
What would have happened once Russia and Austrians showed up who knows but they were war weary also. If ( a mighty big if )Napoleon consented to the 1792 boundaries He may well have kept his throne.
As far as Davout if he was used as a field general and was allowed to actually be a general it's possible. For me after 1809 Napoleon is either jealous or something has happened to Davout because he never reaches the heights of his early years as a corps commander.
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Bonjour Messieurs,
Messieurs, I am very proud of you all :smile: .... a very even-tempered, logical discussion with some productive insights .... ;)
Cordialement, DoE
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@Antiochus
The state of the British army was poor as well. Wellington was disgusted by the way that it had decayed since 1814. Corelli Barnet in Britain and her Army 1509-1970 (a book I read a long time ago so my memory of it may be faulty) argued that this was typical of the British lack of interest in land forces, with undue weight always given to the Navy. If Napoleon had waited on Elba another year then there might not have been a British army waiting for him at Waterloo, or anywhere on the continent.
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The state of the British army was poor as well.
But not so poor , I think :?: . The overall quality of British infantry was the best in the world in those last Napoleonic years; the French Imperial Guard only (the Old and Middle Guard) could have been better; but the overall quality of French infantry at Waterloo wasn't so good as the British; certainly French infantry wasn't the same infantry who fought at Austerlitz!! About the Cavalry, I think the French one was better, but the British Cavalry was not so bad, after years of practice: in 1815 British horsemen were experienced (and they had very high quality horses). About Artillery, yes, the French one was incomparable, mighty, the British one good but without "excellence", I think.
The low morale of the Army and the Nation was an important cause in the defeat of Napoleon; but my opinion is the French made lot of mistakes in the Campaign and in the three main battles (the Allied too, but less). One mistake above all: the behaviour of Grouchy! If Grouchy have had fever ;) and could not have been in command the 18th of June, I could say that EVERY general (not necessarily the great Davout) had marched towards the "sound" of the firing guns, so the French had won the battle! ;)
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The quality of the training of D'Erlon's First Corps was so bad that his Soldiers could not be formed into Battalion Column by Divisions or Colonne de Attaque. The infantry of the First Corps approached the Allied line in dense unwieldy columns that had no maneuverability.
I assume that these unwieldy formations of column were used because the infantry lacked the training required to maneuver in battalion colonne de attaque.
Is this correct?
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Remember that the British is actually in the minority in the Allied Army. Majority are Dutch-Belgian (low-low quality)
and some German contingents (OK).
Welly
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Its unfair to dismiss all the DB troops as being poor, they actually performed pretty in many parts of the campaign if you objectively analyse them.
Discussing troop quality is a real minefield especially as nationalistic bias kicks in for most of us...hopefully we wont get too bogged down it it here!
I think the fatal mistake Napoleon made in the campaign was to give up his central position following Ligny - I think Napoleon over-estimated how mauled the Prussian army was (remember an entire Corps of the Rhine Army was not even engaged at Ligny) and was content to let Grouchy passively follow what he thought was a beaten army rather than actively drive the Prussians back and away from Wellington.
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Remember that the British is actually in the minority in the Allied Army. Majority are Dutch-Belgian (low-low quality)
and some German contingents (OK).
Welly
Anything none English was considered poor quality by English writers Its called national bias or more accurately irrational national bias . The Dutch were as good and as well lead as many of the English regiments and performed just as well as the bulk of the allied troops and better then some.
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Anything none English was considered poor quality by English writers Its called national bias or more accurately irrational national bias . The Dutch were as good and as well lead as many of the English regiments and performed just as well as the bulk of the allied troops and better then some.
I would largely agree with you though I suspect alot of this was due to the mistrust of the loyalty and motivation of the DB troops which my have distorted many comptempary writers views. I suspect that if you are Dutch or a Belgium you find this extremely annoying when its repeated now and its due in no small part to Bernard Cornwells novel about the battle.
The thing to remember about the allied army is that even if alot of the troops were raw most of the officers were professional veterans of numerous campaigns - there was no shortage of experienced officers in Europe in 1815!
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Didn't the Dutch-Belgians save the day when all the Scots ran from the ridge?
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Run away? They are smart enough to protect themselves with the reversed slope tactics. Do you remember who reppelled
d'Erlon's attack?
Welly
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OK Guys, as the person who started this topic, I feel the need to calm it down when it's getting heated. So let's keep the discussions away from "Nationalistic Pride" and concentrate on who was to blame.
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All I am trying to say is Wellington and the British contingents should shoulder some of the 'blames' for Nappy's defeat.
Yes, Davout might tip the balance. But if it was Blucher/Kutusov/Schwarzenberg incommand instead of Wellington and
Prussian/Russian/Austrian in the field instead of British, would you think Waterloo might turn out to be a Nappy victory?
Welly
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Wellesley the actual and focused topic of conversation in this thread was meant to be the question of: From the French side alone, who was to blame for Waterloo?
It's a narrow question.
The issue is: Of all of the French commanders and staff officers, which one or ones were most to blame for their negative outcome of the Waterloo Campaign of 100 Days?
You can agree that, when the issue is framed in this manner, the merits of the Allied commanders and soldiers are topics that are outside of the scope of the question, yes?
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Jean, you have said exactly what I was trying to convey. Thankyou. It is acknowledged by all that Wellington and Blucher played their part well but that is not the topic question
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Thank you for your compliments.
A separate thread discussing the converse of this issue, namely, who takes most of the credit on the Allied side, should generate a lively discussion of the merits of both Wellington and Blucher. Both were fine commanders, and among the best of their era.
But, of course, that discussion is not for this thread.
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After doing a lot more reading and video documentary watching etc... I realised that in the Davout affair I had only concentrated on the Strategic. All the tactical opinions posted had their own merit. I have my opinion now on the worst of the tactical errors.
Marching D'erlon between Quatre Bras and Ligny back and forth. D'erlon followed the Emperors orders and set of from Quatre Bras to Ligny, Ney countermanded them, D'erlon marched back. He took no part in either battle, his presence in either may well have been decisive. This would have changed everything on the 18th, if the 18th even would then have happened
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Both wellington and Napoleon did everything right in Waterloo as i see it. It just favoured wellington in the end
At the most unclear orders could be to blame for some of the french armies mistakes. That was no ones fault realy
Nap had to move davot to train an army to fight russia and aust. If that had not been done and nap won waterloo he would not have what he needed to face them
Change in staff due to some needing to be replaced assinations n natual death
The replacement just sent the orders as he got them but the prevous rewrote them to make them more clear
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I did some reading too.
* Napoleon is to blame for the events leading up to Waterloo, going back to his invasion of Russia etc., killing off his horses, unable to stop the guys in Germany. ;)
* d'Erlon's useless marches 2 days earlier.
* the unsupported calvary attack of Ney. I read everywhere that had Napoleon sent in his guard right then and there, he would have smashed the Allies. Why was he so reluctant in using them? Perhaps he didn't know the state of affairs of the Allies during the attacks? (see next point)
* lack of proper communication - the ridge which blocked Napoleon's view of the real state of infantry during the cavalry attacks. Had he known how it looked, he might have made a decision regarding sending in the guard. Yet it seems he didn't.
Belle Alliance is about a mile from the ridge. Was it so troublesome to get such a message across?
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Russia caused him to lose the war aginst the 6th coalition too. If he hadnt there would of been no 6th col in the first place
If napoleon did ever make mistake it was to invade russia
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I remember a saying which goes something like: When God wanted to destroy someone, He would first make him proud.
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I blame Wellington and Blucher!......Thy did so well in this campgnain.....
Wellington with this nice hold in Mont St Jean and Blucher with his so nice rush in "song of guns" the day fatidic!
The calm of wellington and the "rage" (the agressivity) of Blucher win this battle more than the errors of our generals
(except the case of Hougoumont... see the topic about it)
I think that.
Salutations.
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Grouchy could have allowed Gerard to "march to the sound of the guns" on the morning of the 18th. Now, there probably were good reasons for the decision Grouchy actually made like not knowing much about where the Prussians currently were, what they were doing and his existing orders from Napoleon. However, had Gerard's Corps been detached and marched via Mont St Guibert-Mousty-Lasnes they could well have caught elements of the Prussian army moving throught the LAsnes defile on the late afternoon of the 18th. Very likely this would have been Pirch's corps strung out in a column of march. As Steven Marthinsen demonstrates in hi "Napoleon's Waterloo Campaign: An Alternative History" such a situation would have seriously disrupted the Prussian attack. With Bulows corps most likely already engaged around Planchenoit only Zieten's corps would have been left free to manouvre, In the historical battle we know Ziethen very nearly decided to support Bulow instead of Wellington's left flank.In the historical battle it was only Muffling's success in convininving Ziethen that Wellingotn was not retreating that prevented the Prussian general from taking the decision to move on Planchenoit. Such a move would have taken Ziethen out of the battle for a short but critical period. In the even of Gerard attacking at LAsne however ZIethen's orders might well have had to be changed to require him to support Pirch's corps which, had it been cauaght in order of march would have been in serious trouble.
This would have taken the pressure off Napoleon's right flank. With Lobau now only having to contend with Bulow much more of the Imperial Guard would have been availabkle for the atttack on Wellington. Furthermore Durutte would have been free to take Papelotte without having to worry about Zieten. Wellington could not have moved Viavian and Vandaleur's cavalry to support his centre. This would have given the Gaurd a much better chance to succeed. It would then have depended on whether Wellington held his army together or not.
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