The French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars
Alan Forrest
If the years from 1740 had seen repeated trials of strength between armies European powers, these were dwarfed by Wars French Revolution and Empire. Between 1792 1815 France was almost constantly in a state war with coalitions states, 1803 — after collapse truce signed at Amiens there no peace across greater part continent until Napoleon’s final defeat Waterloo. Napoleon himself moved restlessly one campaign to another, fighting some sixty battles all winning great majority them (Gates, 1997, p. 5). Indeed, sheer scale warfare made it difficult for contemporaries regard Revolutionary Napoleonic as simply continuation traditional struggles states that characterized eighteenth century. They distorted trade patterns consumed an unprecedented proportion country’s economic wealth. And objectives not limited customary aims wars, be they acquisition granaries, neighbouring territories or overseas colonies, dynastic successions, (as Louis XIV) dreams attaining natural frontiers. France, appeared, now thought on altogether more ambitious scale, attempting impose its new polity much continental Europe during revolutionary years, before aspiring create Carolingian empire under Napoleon.
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