Peninsular War WI: Napoleon decides to campaign in Spain in 1812

By February 1812, the position of the French in Spain was deteriorating especially in the north. The failure of the 2nd invasion of Portugal, combined with the unsuccessful ongoing siege off Cadiz demonstrated the decline of French power from its height in 1809. The fall of Ciudad Rodrigo in January of that year opened northern Spain to an invasion from Portugal, and set the stage for Salamanca, and the series of disasters that would see the French driven from Castile back to Catalonia within a year.

However, this was not the first time that French fortunes in Spain had fallen. In June of 1808, the British and their Spanish allies had nearly driven the French from Portugal and Spain, and had advanced to the foot of the Pyrenees. It was in those circumstances that Napoleon had campaigned in person in 1808 to revive the fortunes of his empire in Spain. He largely succeeded; while the British Expeditionary force was not entirely eliminated, it was forced to evacuate, and nearly every major Spanish city occupied by the French, and were nominally subjected to the rule of Joseph Bonaparte.

It was in these circumstances that Napoleon started to prepare for his invasion of Russia, an enterprise that diverted over 30,000 troops from his army of Spain, setting the stage for the precipitous decline of the French position in the Iberian Peninsula.

What if, instead of deciding upon an all-or nothing campaign in Russia, Napoleon had opted for another campaign in Spain in 1812, using most of the same multi-national forces that he would have otherwise employed in Russia? Could he have repeated his success in 1808, and perhaps followed up with a third invasion of Portugal? How long would Napoleon have to campaign in Spain before another coalition was formed against him by his erstwhile allies, especially his father-in-law Francis? How might this have affected the long-term prospects of the French Empire?
 
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The main problem with this is that Napoleon really seemed to distance himself from Spain after his initial campaign plus Russia was seen as the greater threat. If you can somehow get Russia to go along with the Continental System for a bit longer as well as a series of even worse French losses, then you might force Napoleon's hand once more.

That said, him being in Spain doesn't guarantee victory as Wellington always had the Lines of Torres Vedras to fall back on. He'd wait behind them, let the supply situation fall apart once more and Napoleon forced back to safer ground. To succeed fully, Napoleon is really going to have to change the situation in Spain as well as address the dire logistics situation that the French Army constantly faced.
 
I echo what DAv said. I'm not sure if Napoleon would have made the same mistakes as Massena at Bussaco (although given the contempt that he expressed for Wellington and British before Waterloo he might very well have tried the same frontal attacks on the position) but he would have ended up in the same situation - sitting in front of the Lines of Torres Vedra, in an impossible logistical situation, with a starving army and with Portuguese irregulars crawling all over his LOC.
 
The main problem with this is that Napoleon really seemed to distance himself from Spain after his initial campaign plus Russia was seen as the greater threat. If you can somehow get Russia to go along with the Continental System for a bit longer as well as a series of even worse French losses, then you might force Napoleon's hand once more.

That said, him being in Spain doesn't guarantee victory as Wellington always had the Lines of Torres Vedras to fall back on. He'd wait behind them, let the supply situation fall apart once more and Napoleon forced back to safer ground. To succeed fully, Napoleon is really going to have to change the situation in Spain as well as address the dire logistics situation that the French Army constantly faced.

I echo what DAv said. I'm not sure if Napoleon would have made the same mistakes as Massena at Bussaco (although given the contempt that he expressed for Wellington and British before Waterloo he might very well have tried the same frontal attacks on the position) but he would have ended up in the same situation - sitting in front of the Lines of Torres Vedra, in an impossible logistical situation, with a starving army and with Portuguese irregulars crawling all over his LOC.


I am not terribly familiar with the geography of Portugal, but would it have been feasible for Napoleon or one of his Marshals to box in Wellington in Lisbon, while, say, a French army in the North and another in the South besieged and captured the other major Portuguese cities, especially its ports? This would obviously be a logistical challenge with the RN controlling the sea lanes, but would it have been impossible if enough men and cavalry were dispatched to protecting the supply lines?

The Portuguese army performed quite poorly when not directly supported by the British, especially during the second invasion. In the lead-up to the first battle of Porto, Soult was outnumbered in terms of men, guns and cavalry in the early stages, but still won decisively.

Finally, in a third invasion, the French would be aware from the beginning of the Lines, and the probable British strategy. Would it have been impossible to prepare a route for an invasion in advance, by say preparing magazines in the preceding months, as Napoleon did before invading Russia?
 
I am not terribly familiar with the geography of Portugal, but would it have been feasible for Napoleon or one of his Marshals to box in Wellington in Lisbon, while, say, a French army in the North and another in the South besieged and captured the other major Portuguese cities, especially its ports?

Thing is, that would have been regarded as a perfectly acceptable sacrifice from the point of view of the allies as they'd already done that once by retreating behind the Lines. They even enacted a scorched earth policy for good measure. The idea of waiting behind the lines, protecting Lisbon (Which was behind the Lines) and waiting until the French Army starves, kills itself at the Walls or retreats.

The Portuguese army performed quite poorly when not directly supported by the British, especially during the second invasion.

They improved vastly though and were seen as very good soldiers later in the War.

Would it have been impossible to prepare a route for an invasion in advance, by say preparing magazines in the preceding months, as Napoleon did before invading Russia?

Not impossible but considering the size of the French army, the terrain they were travelling on which greatly impacted upon their resource gathering and the fact that Napoleon was forced to always have one eye on Paris, I don't think it would have had as great an impact as it could have done. Basically, Portugal was worse off than Russia when Napoleon first marched through the latter and Napoleon had men starving to death even when he had time to march east. I think the situation would be even worse going across fought over and already ravished territory.
 
If the french limit themselves to campaigning in Spain, then Russia attacks, as planned, in the grand duchy of Warsaw.
 
If the french limit themselves to campaigning in Spain, then Russia attacks, as planned, in the grand duchy of Warsaw.


Without a French invasion, I think the Russians would have been hard-pressed to assemble an army and be prepared for a campaign much before Autumn of 1812, and that would have been too late to start a campaign, even if they did terminate their Turkish war in June, as OTL. That means Spring of 1813 is the earliest that the Russians are likely to invade, giving Napoleon plenty of time to conclude a campaign in Spain.

But without the immediate threat of a French invasion, would the Russians have curtailed their successful Ottoman War as OTL? The Russians had been doing quite well, and with more encouragement of France, might have very well have penetrated deep into Bulgaria, or even linked up with Karageorge in Serbia. Napoleon had secured an alliance with the Ottomans in 1806, and had supported them diplomatically against the Russians when he forced them to sign the Treaty of Tilsit. If Napoleon decisively threw his support behind Russian expansion in the Balkans, I think it is reasonable to think that the Russians might be diverted for at least a year or two.
 
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