rior to Marengo Napoleon wrote this bulletin
which in part satirized the Austrian attitude to the
French Army, this section reads:<br> "The French troops
[the Austrians believe] were nothing but water
spaniels, commanded by Generals of no military capacity.
Especially did they delight in lampooning the Army of
Reserve: in their caricatures they showed the cavalry
mounted on donkeys, the infantry as regiments of old men,
incapable of marching, and of children armed with sticks,
on the point of which were bayonets, and the
artillery consisted only of two blunderbusses, the caliber
of which was about a pound. Now they are beginning
to sing to quite a different tune, and there seems
to be a spirit of discontent among there
troops."<br> Major General Sir John Adye states: "In the
practiced hands of the First Consul these bulletins became
a vehicle for satire and for political propaganda,
and it must have given him no little satisfaction to
declare that theAustrians classed his infantry as
spaniels and armed his artillery with
blunderbusses."<br><br>NAPOLEON OF THE SNOWS. John Adye. (London: Nash &
Grayson,
1931.) p.175 and p.270

think we made a mistake...<br>Our ranking (including mine) contains only recent
tacticians<br>Maybe we should make a new ranking our the best generals of the
Antiquity

eaving aside the fact that the Master himself
(Napoleon) was "beat" (with the aid of a few Prussians) by a
general who wouldn't IMHO make the top tier (Wellie,
highly competent but not great), here is Napoleon's list
of Great Captains: "The principles of warfare are
those which guided the great captains whose deeds
history has transmitted to us--Alexander, Hannibal,
Cæsar, Gustavus Adolphus, Turenne, Eugene of Savoy,
Frederick the Great...The history of their eighty three
campaigns would constitute a complete treatise on the art
of war."<br> On Hannibal's crossing the Alps and
invading Italy, Napoleon said: "No vaster and grander plan
was ever carried out by man."

think hanniabl was a great general but not good
enough to make the top 10. He was outsmarted by the
roman's strategy about midway through the Punic war and
he lost to Scipio who didn,t event make the top 10
himself

'm surprised that Hannibal rates so low as to not make the top 10.  Is this a
case of bad public relations?

don't agree with Foch and Davout.  But the rest is acceptable

his is the ultimate ranking of the best generals
all time<br>1. Napoleon<br>2. Von Manstein<br>3.
Rommel<br>4. Frederick the Great<br>5. Montgommery<br>6.
Foch<br>7. Davout<br>8. Wellington<br>9. Charles XII <br>10.
Turenne

. Napoleon<br>2. Rommel<br>3. Alexander the great<br>4. Frederick <br>5.
Caesar<br>6. Gustavus Adolphus<br>7. Nelson<br>8. Turennes<br>9.
Washington<br>10. Patton

Although I'm biased) Certainly Napoleon would
rank in the top five of the "Great Captains", with
Hannibal and Alexander (and Frederick, Cæsar and Gustavus
Adolphus, perhaps? Even though that makes six! I'll leave
the exact order to someone else.). I wouldn't put
Rommel in that heady league, even though he was no
slouch himself.

t seems that the people here all know something about the Emperor!

ou may be confusing Prussia with Germany.
Napoleon was fairly popular with the Germans until 1810
and regained some of his popularity after 1815 in
response to German dislike of Prussia. It's important to
remember that not all Germans wanted to be a part of a
Prussian dominated Germany.<br> Using your same logic,
shouldn't we blame Britain ignoring the future threat of a
unified, Prussia-dominated Germany when it allied itself
with Prussia in 1815 (and passively supported Germany
in 1870)?

think you forgot to consider that the hatred
between the french and the Germans comes back a long time
ago, you can see traces of fights between tribes fro
germany and tribes from France as far as the Roman
period.<br><br>I think Napoleon might have risen the hatred
between the two nations but they hated each other a long
time ago. I don't think that Napoleon had such a great
influence on WWII or WWI because after all, Farnce joined
these wars because of alliances with other countries,
they didn't start it.

he way I see it, a direct result of the
Confederation of the Rhine was the unification of Germany. When
he defeated Prussia, they forever hated the French.
Therefore, as seen in the Franco Prussian War, they then get
the French to hate them. World War II was like the
Franco Prussian International War. France this time won
(with her allies of course) and upset Germany. In World
War II, after taking out some weaklings, Germany took
France, never forgeting how much they loathed the land of
Napoleon.

i everyone, I am new here... After being Invited by salerno_godfather...

e suis un nouveau membre de ce club et j'espère
qu'un jour je vais tomber sur un autre des 3
Bonapartistes qui s'y trouvent.<br>I'm a new member of this
club and I really hope that I will find one of the 3
Bonapartists listed here soon.

e have a new member in the club, my very good <br>friend Goldenjet_99, welcome
in !!!!

If I died in a castle, I woudl have been an emperor.  If I died on the
battlefield I would have been a hero.  Now, I will die in exile and be
God"<br><br>Napoleon Bonaparte to the english doctor

The art of war is to march 12 leagues, fight a battle, and march 12 more in
pursuit." --Napoleon

agree about comparisons between Hitler and
Napoleon, and said as much in my post. <br> The Germans
didn't necessarily have a technological superiority,
their superiority was tactical--the way they used
masses of tanks to achieve a breakthrough rather than
assigning small numbers of tanks to a large number of
units. In fact the German army in WWII was still largely
horse-based. The idea that the German army was wholely
mechanized is a myth.

'll have to check with CINC home, but I should be able to make it.

i, <br>I would like to hold a chat session on comparasion<br>between Austerlitz
and Wagram, Friday February 5th<br>at 9 pm eastern time<br><br>All welcome

was reading the book Ben Weider wrote about
Napoleon lately, it is incredible how he 'was making war
with legs instead of arms". Napoleon had understood
how speed and fast invasions were important but I
don't think it was the same thing for Hitler. For sure,
Rommel had studied Napoleonic history but it is mainly
because of their technological superiority that the nazis
were able to defeat their ennemies so
quickly.<br><br>Besides, Napoleon's battles were elegant, like a ballet or
a painting. The nazis were dirty ruthless, cruel. I
think that any parallel between Napoleon and Hitler
causes great prejudice to the appreciation of napoleon

propos of my previous posting I will offer this
quote from one of Napoleon's opponents in the Italian
campaign (from Maximillen Vox's NAPOLEON. p.7)which speaks
for itself: "There is no longer any way to figure it
out. We are dealing with a damned little rascal of a
general who is first in front of us, then behind us, then
on our flanks. You never know how you should take up
your position. This manner of warfare is absolutely
wrong. It completely disregards customary practice."

lthough I am leery of Napoleon/Hitler
comparisons, I think there is a correlation between the German
blitzkrieg tactics an Napoleon's tactics in Italy or in the
Ulm and Austerlitz campaign in the sense that in both
instances the enemy commanders were bewildered by the rapid
movements of their opponents. Napoleon said that he could
control everything but time. To quote J. Holland Rose
(LIFE OF NAPOLEON, vol. 2 p.18): "Whereas the Austrians
believed he would not be able to reach the Danube in force
before November 10th, [Napoleon] intended to have
200,000 men in Germany by September 18th."

'm not sure wether it was a blitxkrieg since the Austrain forces expected
Napoleon to be somewhere else than he really was, although it would be
interesting to have a little chat about it.

just purchased Bowden's book "Napoleon and
Austerlitz: The Glory Years 1805-1807."<br><br>An excellent
book. In chapter three Bowden talks about the Ulm
Campaign (1805) as being the first blitzkrieg.<br><br>You
all want to discuss it?

ello<br><br>Glad to join your club. I have
walked two of the Napoleonic battlefields - Waterloo and
Boradino.<br>I am also a member of the US based Napoleonic
Society of American and Napoleonic Alliance.<br><br>What
topics do you want to discuss? <br><br>I have also
started a club. Its now under the main Yahoo military
listing and is called "Land Warfare." Check it out and
see if you'd be interestsed in joining.<br><br>You
may also want to check out the picture of Waterloo I
have posted on my home page at www.mhrc-va.com It is
located under "Supporter Benefits" and then down to
picture archive. Let me know what you think.

Welcome, This is the Yahoo! Message Board for Napoleonic club community.