I know this was a favorite counter factual speculation since the 19th century, but I've never really seen it answered. It's assumed Napoleon would remain in power. But how does history continue from there?
Let me qualify that Napoleon doesn't invade Russia because Alexander's empire is wrought with more internal strife and weakness so the Czar is more differential to Napoleon.
Problem: most of the internal strife in Russia before the Patriotic War was discontent at the French entente and all it entailed: the continental system and, so Russians thought, being held back from the Ottomans and threatened by an Insidious Polish Conspiracy. Tsars could easily be removed by a discontented aristocracy at this time: it happened to Alexander's father, in fact, leaving a very strong impression on the boy, which is one of the many reason's why he was so messed up in the attic. So if the scenario you're imagining is that Alex becomes a dedicated Francophile for some reason and this causes a noble conspiracy against him, they'll probably succeed, and then you have an anti-French government in place, which brings us back in circles.
See, for all that Napoleon and Alexander are everybody's favourite historical
ship, Russian and French policy clashed fundamentally, principally over the issue of the Continetal System, which impoverished Russia (which is to say, the nobles and merchants, but they were, politically, all that mattered) for French benefit. The Franco-Russian Alliance of Doom for Britain (!!
) had begun with Russia and France reaching a military stalemate. Russia couldn't reverse the defeats of its continental allies, Napoleon couldn't, at that point, realistically invade Russia. So he offered them what looked like a very generous settlement. The Polish question was put on the back burner and Russia given a free hand to continue its war with Turkey on the Danube.
As time wore on, though, the Russians began to become less grateful for the deal they had gotten: the Duchy of Warsaw could very easily become the Kingdom of Poland, and more importantly Russia was being economically crippled. The Austrian War broke Napoleon's myth of invincibility: Wagram, they say, was the last victory. And Britain was hardly being brought to its knees: Europe was getting the worst of the trade war, and we were bleeding Napoleon in Spain, which was what had allowed the Austrian War to happen.
So in 1810, with the weakening of France, the Russians basically stopped observing the system. They knowingly bought British goods and sold them at inflated prices in Germany. This not only wrecked Napoleon's blockade, it also ruined the important French merchants who he had granted licenses to trade with Britain to raise finance.
So now he basically had three options: make concessions to Russia to restore the system (ie sell Poland), which would only put him in the exact same situation a couple of years later, but with a worse military situation, ignore Russia and see his Continetal System crumble and Russia and Britain sign a new coalition, or try to force Russia back into line by a short, sharp, military shock. He chose the third (note that all he intended was to force Russia to rejoin his System in the vain hope that Britain would come to the table before the issue came up again: he actually
didn't recreate the Kingdom of Poland, and probably should have).
As I said, the first wasn't really a clever idea. The second is interesting. Given how clear it was the Britain was winning the trade war anyway, the collapse of the System and Russian defiance will break any hope Napoleon has of ever winning in Spain, let alone signing an advantageous peace with Britain. But Russia is still in for some surprises if they try to open hostilities. I's imagine that Metternich will steeple his fingers and cackle madly in between writing noncommital letters to all involved. If Napoleon has a sudden attack of common sense, he could at last sign some sort of lasting peace: he could get the French colonies, or the rights to them, restored, and his Great France recognised, but withdraw from Spain and accept some major revision of the Polish and German situations.
Napoleon, of course, lacked common sense and had plenty of aggression, so really attack was the only option he could realistically take.
[VK];2554550 said:
I somewhere heared that Napoleon sayd something like: "If the Czar wouldn't be a man he would marry him" So They both had really good relations, I don't know when they ended, but maybe a Alliance could be established, or (maybe ASB
) they evan marry
Between Tilsit and the Patriotic War, France and Russia were formal allies. Even as the Franco-Russian relations disintegrated, Russian remained theoretically at war with Britain. There was also a Russian expeditionary force in Galicia during the Austrian War, who sustained a single casualty (and not from the Austrians, either) and got the city of Tarnopol for their trouble, which is rather emblematic of how the Russian's milked the whole deal.