Gentlemen

Gentlemen...

What should Napoleon have done to defeat Britain or at least to maintain France dominance on the mainland?

>Hard mode: You start at Waterloo

>Hard mode: You start at Waterloo

It was already over
The answer is he shouldnt have invaded Russia

>don't invade Russia
>Britain gets rich
>Russia invades Warsaw
>Austria turns
>Prussia probably turns

Not an option

Allied with Britain

Legit serious

More like:
1. Recruit polar dogs
2. Build dog sleds
3. Research clothes
4. Invadia Russia, IN WINTER, via a legion of polar sleighers.

Abandon the continental system

supported any actual Spaniard to be King instead of his brother.

Try to make peace with Britain.

Otherwise just content yourself with being master of central Europe.

And why the fuck would Britain do that

Don't attempt a coup in Spain, try recruiting them into the Second Empire diplomatically.

what could he have done tactically/strategically in military terms to defeat russia?

Napoleon ,as Hitler,would have never won in any possible scenario because of the simple fact that his whole end game was based on expansionism alone,an ambicious deed that always leads to disaster. It's like going deeper into the ocean,you have to cover more area the more you get to the center and you lose power on the harbor

No, his end game was just making peace with Britain, which they constantly refused, even after five failed coalitions.

Most of the wars Napoleon fought were defensive, so that's not really true.

Britain was the aggressor in every war since the Revolution, funding everyone they could to take on the Republic, and then Napoleon. They were scared shitless that revolutionary fervor might spread to Britain and wanted to revert France to a monarchy.

When Britain accepted a peace treaty in 1803, they still actively sought to bring down the French government, leading to another war. And then another. And then another. Napoleon propsed peace treaties time after time, but the British didn't really see the need to oblige him considering the brunt of the casualties on the Coalition side fell on the Continental powers.

>Start at waterloo
Don't give ney the entire french cavalry that's what

Win at Trafalgar

>Napoleon ,as Hitler,would have never won in any possible scenario because of the simple fact that his whole end game was based on expansionism alone

Not really, his end game was forcing the surrender of all the countries that were already openly hostile. If Britain had given up, it would be pretty much over.

5. Kill Russians while singing Le chant de l'Oignon

>You start at Waterloo

Well shit. Strategic withdrawal under cover of heavy artillery fire, send a division of French forces to Ireland and try to distract the Brits with a rebellion, and hope to god you can gather enough men to nullify the British-Prussian numbers.

Pushing on Petersburg after he conquered Moscow

That's like saying the emperor should have allied France to win the 30 years war.

His man in Spain, Godoy, was extremely unpopular too.

This.

>Napoleon ,as Hitler,would have never won in any possible scenario because of the simple fact that his whole end game was based on expansionism alone,an ambicious deed that always leads to disaster.

Yep, you're a tard
Napoleon wanted to rule France only initially.
Being the monarch of one of Europe's greatest powerhouses was enough for the lowbirth corsican nobody he was
Then Britain started the Napoleonic Wars and Napoleon had to conquer half Europe in self-defense against British funded coalitions

how do you get past the strongest navy in the world in there home territory

Charging with your cavalry

Why not just capture St. Petersburg and just wait for the Russians to attack? Cut the Russians off from the sea and sit pretty.

Pretty much. Nice trips

Did the Russians really rely on the sea that much?

>Hard mode: You start at Waterloo
Commit the old guard sooner, instead of waiting for the British center to reform.

You sail around it.
As big of a issue is that its the world strongest navy, the distance you have to sail is actually less than a landscape.

Take Moscow and then Petersburg
Guarenteed surrender
Still better than taking Moscow only to sit in it for months until winter comes anyway

There was another thread, not sure if it was about Napoleon, WW1, WW2 or all three, but a few anons went into great detail why capturing St. Petersburg would be hard for even a WW2 army, let alone a Napoleonic one.

Why the British were such vicious cunts?

The Russian army was utter shit during the Napoleonic Wars, it was forced to retreat all the way from Vilnius to Moscow in a spawn of two months
A few miles more to conquer would've been a walk in the park for Napoleon

>The Russian army was utter shit during the Napoleonic Wars, it was forced to retreat all the way from Vilnius to Moscow in a spawn of two months

Seems like it was an extremely effective strategy, not "shit."

It wasnt a strategy though, they were forced to do that by their inferiority
In the end it worked (mainly because Nappy sat in Moscow instead of continuing to push firther or leave immediatly), but the Russians didnt plan from the begenning to retreat after each battle burning half their country in the process

British policy had it that no single country should ever grow too powerful as to control the entire Continent

Is this even a valid (as in ethical) reason to invade someone?

Britain didn't invade France proper at any point between 1796 and 1815. They formed the coalitions in attempt to depose Napoleon.

>The Battle of Nivelle (10 November 1813) took place in front of the River Nivelle near the end of the Peninsular War (1808–1814). After the Allied siege of San Sebastian, Wellington's 80,000 British, Portuguese and Spanish troops (20,000 of the Spaniards were untried in battle) were in hot pursuit of Marshal Soult who only had 60,000 men to place in a 20-mile perimeter. After the Light Division, the main British army was ordered to attack and the 3rd Division split Soult's army into two. By 2 o'clock, Soult was in retreat and the British in a strong offensive position. Soult had lost 4,351 men to Wellington's 2,450.

At Waterloo, the best he could have achieve was consolidating his rule in France.

To dominate Europe, he should have defeated the British navy. Britain is useless without it's fleet and acces to her colonies.

>Napoleon fights a divided rest of Europe, eventually gets defeated
>Europe is now mostly unified, France is severely weakened
>'lol I should return and try conquering Europe again, we have so much better odds now than the last time'

What was he thinking?

Can you not fucking read

> The Russian army was utter shit during the Napoleonic Wars, it was forced to retreat all the way from Vilnius to Moscow in a spawn of two months
> A few miles more to conquer would've been a walk in the park for Napoleon

Distance from Vilnus to Moscow = 900+ kms

Distance from Moscow to St. Petersburg = 700+ kms

And these are russian """"roads"""" mind you

They live in fear of the next big Empire taking over them.
Their history has shown thats how it has been, and being a shitty European backwater, and observing Poland and the Baltic states, as well as the German speaking states?

Its in their best interest to not be conquest for some "Big Euro empire".
The only wierd part is that they don't want to nuke Russia.

The strategy with Russia is to keep them far. Russians are not a threat to Britain as long as they're kept to their own areas of influence and don't go too far.

That's why there was never a problem with russians invading Poland or liberating Romania but the Crimean War and the treaty of Berlin happened. This is why Churchill had no problem dividing the areas of influence in Europe with Stalin, as long as Greece was respected as western and not communist. Even during the Great Game in Asia the priority was to keep the Russians far enough from India.

cut a canal between the atlantic & iberia

>That's why there was never a problem with russians invading Poland
Gee, thanks assholes.