What would a Napoleonic England look like?

mowque

Banned
Why must a 'successful invasion' be absolute? It is one thing to get there, and even win a battle or two but conquer the entire UK? With no land connection and tenuous logistics at best? With a Europe who will be chafing the whole time he is gone?
 

Thande

Donor
I'm surprised nobody has posted the obvious yet.

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Baphomet

Banned
Why must a 'successful invasion' be absolute? It is one thing to get there, and even win a battle or two but conquer the entire UK? With no land connection and tenuous logistics at best? With a Europe who will be chafing the whole time he is gone?


Since we can assume that a sucessful invasion means the RN have been defeated,(that's a given) ressuply routes to the beachheads in Dover would be easier.
Anyway I seriously doubt England could or would present a long term viable insurgency and any insurgencies would not present the type of problem the Peninsural War did in (otl) given that there are no other major powers left in mainland Europe to assume the role England did in Spain.
Would some in Europe chafe while the French army is in England? Sure, but not enough to threaten French hegemony in the mainland.
 

amphibulous

Banned
Why must a 'successful invasion' be absolute? It is one thing to get there, and even win a battle or two but conquer the entire UK? With no land connection and tenuous logistics at best? With a Europe who will be chafing the whole time he is gone?

Napoleon is used to foraging and the UK is a much richer environment than anywhere else in Europe. And the British Army is small.

Otoh, how many men can Boney land?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napoleon's_planned_invasion_of_the_United_Kingdom

From 1803 to 1805 a new army of 200,000 men.. A large "National Flotilla"[1] of invasion barges was built in Channel ports along the coasts of France and Holland (then under French domination as the Batavian Republic), right from Etaples to Flushing, and gathered at Boulogne... when Napoleon ordered a large-scale test of the invasion craft despite choppy weather and against the advice of his naval commanders such as Charles René Magon de Médine (commander of the flotilla's right wing), they were shown up as ill-designed for their task and, though Napoleon led rescue efforts in person, many men were lost.

Napoleon also seriously considered using a fleet of troop-carrying balloons as part of his proposed invasion force and appointed Marie Madeline Sophie Blanchard as an air service chief, though she said the proposed aerial invasion would fail because of the winds.[4] (France's first military balloon had been used in 1794 by Jean-Marie Coutelle.[5]) Though an aerial invasion proved a dead-end, the prospect of one captured the minds of the British print media and public.

Cough.. Sea Lion... cough.
 
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Thande

Donor
Actually, I can't decide whether a Napoleonic invasion would lead to a natoinal crisis, like it did in Spain, or to everyone rallying around the flag. Hrm.

This is Britain, we can do both at the same time!

Obviously the propaganda isn't realistic but it does give you an idea of attitudes towards some of the points raised above--note how they feel the need to address the idea that Irish Catholics might be better off under French rule by saying they wouldn't be, but not Scotland.
 
I think Napolean might make Ireland and Scotland independent, perhaps Wales too. Cornwall and Northern England (Northumberland + surrounding areas) would probably not support such an idea though it might be toyed with. I could see a relinquishment of some RN ships and a few colonies as well along with rights to bases being discussed, maybe at Dover. Taking the cities is one thing but the English might resort to guerilla tactics a la Robin Hood in different parts of the nation, but London had not been sacked by an opposing force for a *very* long time so I do not think they would want the French sticking around.

Also look for Napolean to consider asking about getting Louisiana back.
 

Baphomet

Banned
Napoleon is used to foraging and the UK is a much richer environment than anywhere else in Europe. And the British Army is small.

Otoh, how many men can Boney land?


Cough.. Sea Lion... cough.


About the baloon invasion. I can see it happening on a limited scale in conjunction with an amphibious invasion. Maybe grenades being dropped from the air, or some scout troops being landed further inland to report on enemy troop movements. If this had occured, I'm sure historians today will be talking about it as a brilliant and most daring feat of military operation far ahead of its time. If this had happened, military historians would point to this invasion as the birth of the "airborne soldier."
 
This is Britain, we can do both at the same time!
.

I think a Revolutionary France is more likely to pose a threat to Britain's elite than Napoleon, if only because the Revolution had a powerful hold on a lot of the British "left" up until a general seized a crown from the Pope.

... Which was worth it.
 

Baphomet

Banned
I think a Revolutionary France is more likely to pose a threat to Britain's elite than Napoleon, if only because the Revolution had a powerful hold on a lot of the British "left" up until a general seized a crown from the Pope.

... Which was worth it.


I agree. A sucessful French invasion in 1796 would have been more of a danger to the English aristocracy than an invasion in let's say 1805.
 
Actually, I can't decide whether a Napoleonic invasion would lead to a natoinal crisis, like it did in Spain, or to everyone rallying around the flag. Hrm.

Against the French!? Even ignoring the fact a Napoleonic constitutional dictatorship is more authoritarian than the British parliamentary settlement, unlike the authoritarianism in Spain, the French are the long hated enemy of the English. The whole country would despise them.

Cornwall and Northern England (Northumberland + surrounding areas) would probably not support such an idea though it might be toyed with.

Why on Earth would a Northern English state be based around Northumbria? It's got no more of an independence streak than anywhere else in Northern England, and it wouldn't have the big industrial cities of Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds etc.
 
well you seem fixed on the idea of a total conquest so theirs little i can say than some colonial changes
 
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