WI - Napoleon achieves pyrrhic victory against Russia

What if Napoleon managed to pull off a costly victory against Russia prior to the collapse of the First French Empire?

Additionally how does this impact the 1806-1812 Russo-Turkish war? Would it have been possible for Russia to lose against France yet win against the Turks?
 
My bad.

Still would the Ottomans be in a position to take advantage of a Russian defeat depending on how the latter loses to France?
 
What if Napoleon managed to pull off a costly victory against Russia prior to the collapse of the First French Empire?

In which form that defeat is going to happen and when? Keep in mind that starting from the early 1813 it is not just Russia but Russia and Prussia. And why Nappy's empire is collapsing if he is victorious against Russia?
 
Envision Napoleon being defeated in the wide context of the Napoleonic Wars, just that he manages to achieve a very costly victory over Russia that makes the conflict not worth it.

The Russian defeat can be the result of French competency / patience (with provisional limited political objectives focused on liberation of Poland as well as Ukraine) and Russian ineptitude / hubris (given there was a big temptation to battle the French instead of retreating) or a combination of both, however the main focus would be to make it a costly victory for the French.
 
Envision Napoleon being defeated in the wide context of the Napoleonic Wars, just that he manages to achieve a very costly victory over Russia that makes the conflict not worth it.

The Russian defeat can be the result of French competency / patience (with provisional limited political objectives focused on liberation of Poland as well as Ukraine) and Russian ineptitude / hubris (given there was a big temptation to battle the French instead of retreating) or a combination of both, however the main focus would be to make it a costly victory for the French.

It seems that you are talking about Napoleon's Russian campaign. IIRC, Clausewitz expressed opinion that Napoleon's victory was either absolutely impossible or close to impossible. Much later Montgomery ("Monty") wrote that NOT marching to Moscow is one of the fundamental military principles. As was described by Caulaincourt, Napoleon's army of 1812 was pretty much doomed just by the organizational reasons, etc.

On a positive (from Nappy's perspective) side, there was a chance to catch and destroy the Russian armies at the very beginning of war due to the idiotic war plan proposed by von Phull, adopted by Alexander and then hastily abandoned (leaving the 1st and 2nd Russian armies with a task of not being defeated piecemeal). I'm not sure that this would be extremely costly for Nappy. The next chance would present itself if the "patriotic" party prevailed after the 1st and 2nd armies met and a general battle happened at Smolensk. Napoleon would definitely win it. However, it is highly questionable if at that point victory in a battle would give him a victory in the war: Alexander was not intended to negotiate and there was plenty of space and resources to keep Russia in war.

So how and on which stage to you envision his victory?
 
One possibility I've seen mentioned, though I'm not sure of the details, was that some Russian Generals wanted to confront Napoleon quickly instead of wearing the Grand Armee down as the Russians historically did, using Russia's strategic depth and General Winter. If the Tsar listens to these generals and decides on an early decisive battle, Napoleon may well inflict another Jena-Auerstedt type victory. It would be a pyrrhic victory as it wouldn't affect Russia's ability to wage war against France in the longer term. If Nappy throws in a couple of humiliating peace terms to boot, war will even be a certainty somewhere down the road.
 
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It seems that you are talking about Napoleon's Russian campaign. IIRC, Clausewitz expressed opinion that Napoleon's victory was either absolutely impossible or close to impossible. Much later Montgomery ("Monty") wrote that NOT marching to Moscow is one of the fundamental military principles. As was described by Caulaincourt, Napoleon's army of 1812 was pretty much doomed just by the organizational reasons, etc.

On a positive (from Nappy's perspective) side, there was a chance to catch and destroy the Russian armies at the very beginning of war due to the idiotic war plan proposed by von Phull, adopted by Alexander and then hastily abandoned (leaving the 1st and 2nd Russian armies with a task of not being defeated piecemeal). I'm not sure that this would be extremely costly for Nappy. The next chance would present itself if the "patriotic" party prevailed after the 1st and 2nd armies met and a general battle happened at Smolensk. Napoleon would definitely win it. However, it is highly questionable if at that point victory in a battle would give him a victory in the war: Alexander was not intended to negotiate and there was plenty of space and resources to keep Russia in war.

So how and on which stage to you envision his victory?

Looking at past threads as an admittingly rough guide. It would likely be a combination of the positive scenario you mentioned paired with an apparently larger defeatist faction at the Russian court in OTL ready to make peace with Napoleon as well as rash Russian Generals, along with the prospect of Napoleon halting the campaign for the season only to later move towards St. Petersburg in the spring of 1813 (or slightly earlier due to news on other fronts in the Napoleonic wars) potentially leading to a costly and likely short-lived French victory.

Perhaps if the defeatist faction at the Russian court got their way, it would inspire a Russian precursor to the stab-in-the-back myth as well as possibly a short-lived revolt.
 
What if Napoleon managed to pull off a costly victory against Russia prior to the collapse of the First French Empire?

Additionally how does this impact the 1806-1812 Russo-Turkish war? Would it have been possible for Russia to lose against France yet win against the Turks?

I'm really impressed about people asking question like: would country x win against y but still beat the Turks.

If I got a penny for everytime someone asked these things... XD

To answer it... it would be possible as Napoleon wanted to punish Russia not really destroy it. But the war ended before Nappy invaded Russia. I guess people were even faster than me I guess.
 
Looking at past threads as an admittingly rough guide. It would likely be a combination of the positive scenario you mentioned paired with an apparently larger defeatist faction at the Russian court in OTL ready to make peace with Napoleon

Anything would be "larger" because such a party did not exist in OTL circa 1812. Anyway, it would not make any serious difference because both Alexander and his brother Constantine (heir to the throne) belonged to the extremely bellicose party. In other words, it would take not just a regicide but a double regicide, which was a little bit too much even for Russia. :)

as well as rash Russian Generals, along with the prospect of Napoleon halting the campaign for the season only to later move towards St. Petersburg in the spring of 1813 (or slightly earlier due to news on other fronts in the Napoleonic wars) potentially leading to a costly and likely short-lived French victory.

Halting campaign where exactly? He was planning to halt it when he took Moscow and the rest is a history. Clausewitz, who is both an authority in military history AND eyewitness of the events, wrote a critical analysis of the scenario in which Napoleon ends campaign in Smolensk, spends winter there and then starts a new offensive. His conclusion was negative but if you wish to argue with him, please go ahead. :confused:

Perhaps if the defeatist faction at the Russian court got their way, it would inspire a Russian precursor to the stab-in-the-back myth as well as possibly a short-lived revolt.

There was no such a party and could not be. Not because everybody was a true believer in a victory but because expressing such opinions would be the end of person's career at court. To give you a general idea, Barclay was considered "unpatriotic" just because he was not eager to fight a major battle against the obviously uneven odds.
 
I'm really impressed about people asking question like: would country x win against y but still beat the Turks.

I can think of at least 32 video games where Ottoman Empire provides a huge headache for players playing their favorite factions/characters/campaigns/whatever. It's often the "thing in my way" rather than "I want to play" leading to a lot of hatred in at least one community. That particular game is a horribly overrated one with a bad European developer that needs to be revoked from steam, but if even a fourth of the games have people feeling like where the Turks are a headache have gone from "annoying me in the game" to "I hate them ARRRGGGG. I need to reload my save. What is wrong with this stupid Empire?" then a lot of them will trickle to here (since this is an internet forum not a real life meeting of armature authors, so there will be a lot of overlap). A lot of cases I bet are subconscious frustration at a game entity. For me, I can separate my game feelings (I own three of said games) and the actual Ottoman Empire (which since I'm a Hapsburg fan, guess which TLs, I prefer to read...)
 
I'm really impressed about people asking question like: would country x win against y but still beat the Turks.

If I got a penny for everytime someone asked these things... XD

Look, it is either about beating the Turks or about defeating the Russians so you have to live with it. If it is about the 100YW it is, in 9 cases out of 10, how the English can beat French more efficiently (actually, I never saw the opposite question so 1 out of 10 is just me being optimistic) and the same goes for English vs. Spaniards. So stop complaining. :cool:
 
In which form that defeat is going to happen and when? Keep in mind that starting from the early 1813 it is not just Russia but Russia and Prussia. And why Nappy's empire is collapsing if he is victorious against Russia?

Prussia was rather marginal in 1813, given how it had been emasculated in 1807.

Napoleon’s defeat resulted from a combination of factors, one enough being not enough :

- first of all, Russia immediately mobilized its full potential in the first half of 1813 instead of taking time to cure the terrible wounds it had just suffered (most of which were self inflicted through scorched earth policy).

- secondly, Napoleon and his allies and vassal States lost a considerable share of their war horses in the 1812 Russian campaign. And you can’t replace war horses the way you can replace rifles, cannons or uniforms. (bonus if you can guess which country was the main purveyor of horses. I can give you a clue. It was a very very very big country, in fact the biggest country on earth, which it still is today). So from 1813 on, Napoleon’s armies were handicapped to turn tactical victories on the field into strategic victories because they could hardly pursue defeated enemy armies during their retreat. During most of the 1813 campaign of Germany, Napoleon had regained his military genius and inflicted several stinging defeats of the russian-prussian forces until he accepted the Austrian truce and mediation proposal.

- thirdly, because he could not secure a strategic victory that would enable him to end the conflict before too many countries joined the coalition. When Austria (Austria was, after Russia, the most decisive factor in bringing down napoleonic France in the 1812/1814 years, far more than Britain, not to mention Prussia) and Sweden joined the coalition and when most of Spain was lost, Napoleon’s odds to come out undefeated became marginal. Only huge luck could then avoid final defeat (and this almost happened on the first day of the battle of Leipzig when a french cavalry brigade came to an inch of capturing by chance the Russian and Prussian monarchs and their staffs).
 
If Alexander lost sanity as result of invasion of Corsican Anti-Christ, how much damage could he inflict to Russia before being eventually assassinated? Free the peasants and call them to Crusade (although making peasants free would be good in long term, in 1812 results would not be nice)?
 
Look, it is either about beating the Turks or about defeating the Russians so you have to live with it. If it is about the 100YW it is, in 9 cases out of 10, how the English can beat French more efficiently (actually, I never saw the opposite question so 1 out of 10 is just me being optimistic) and the same goes for English vs. Spaniards. So stop complaining. :cool:

You really must like me as you reply to e everything I say... interesting...
 
I can think of at least 32 video games where Ottoman Empire provides a huge headache for players playing their favorite factions/characters/campaigns/whatever. It's often the "thing in my way" rather than "I want to play" leading to a lot of hatred in at least one community. That particular game is a horribly overrated one with a bad European developer that needs to be revoked from steam, but if even a fourth of the games have people feeling like where the Turks are a headache have gone from "annoying me in the game" to "I hate them ARRRGGGG. I need to reload my save. What is wrong with this stupid Empire?" then a lot of them will trickle to here (since this is an internet forum not a real life meeting of armature authors, so there will be a lot of overlap). A lot of cases I bet are subconscious frustration at a game entity. For me, I can separate my game feelings (I own three of said games) and the actual Ottoman Empire (which since I'm a Hapsburg fan, guess which TLs, I prefer to read...)

I may... understand... r.i.p. Mamluks 1444-1508
 
Prussia was rather marginal in 1813, given how it had been emasculated in 1807.

Napoleon’s defeat resulted from a combination of factors, one enough being not enough :

- first of all, Russia immediately mobilized its full potential in the first half of 1813 instead of taking time to cure the terrible wounds it had just suffered (most of which were self inflicted through scorched earth policy).

In a reality Russia could not "mobilize its full potential" in the beginning of 1813 by a number of the objective reasons:

1st, Russia did not have universal military service that would allow to conscript the whole age group (at least on paper) as was the case in France. The new troops had been levied by conscripting certain (rather low) percentages of the available male population and sharp increase of that percentage would hurt the serf-owners.

2nd, there were limited resources for training the new recruits (IIRC, a reserve battalion per regiment) and additional experienced cadres could be obtained only by taking them from the fighting army.

3rd, situation with the prepared officer cadres was even worse: there were only very few officer schools and, unlike French army, promotion from the ranks was an exception rather than a rule. Of course, there was always a possibility to use enthusiastic young nobles without any military education as the junior officers but their immediate value was going to be quite low.

4th, the new troops had to be armed and by the end of 1812 Russian military production could not provide enough weapons even for the troops that had been raised. There were, IIRC, significant imports from Britain but than, again, could Britain produce hundreds thousands muskets within couple months?

5th, both new and the existing troops had to be dressed: by the end of campaign of 1812 as far as the uniforms were involved Russian troops were only in a marginally better situation than French (mostly because they knew better how to use what's available). All these uniforms and shoes had to be produced.

6th, while it did not lose as many horses as the French army, the losses still had been high and had to be replaced. Immediate great increase of army size meant a need of additional horses in the tens of thousands (cavalry, artillery, baggage train) and you could not just use the peasant horses; they had to fit quite definite qualifications. Strange as it may sound, these horses were not growing on the trees even in Russia (well, at least not in the numbers needed ;)). They had to be obtained from the breeders and brought to the army. As far as cavalry was involved, they also had to be trained to act in formation.

- secondly, Napoleon and his allies and vassal States lost a considerable share of their war horses in the 1812 Russian campaign. And you can’t replace war horses the way you can replace rifles, cannons or uniforms.

Actually, you can't easily "replace rifles, cannons or uniforms": all these items has to be produced (BTW, "rifles" is a wrong term) and that means that you have to have industry capable of producing them within very short period of time or you have to have huge stockpiles of them. Neither of which is quite trivial task.

(bonus if you can guess which country was the main purveyor of horses. I can give you a clue. It was a very very very big country, in fact the biggest country on earth, which it still is today).

AFAIK, Russia was not exporting horses in the noticeable numbers and, while there was plenty of horses, those considered fit for the military service represented just a tiny percentage of the total. Those who could afford it, had been buying the high quality horses abroad (the British ones had been highly valued). Time when more good quality horses became available domestically was yet to come: modern Don breed became available in 1830's - 50's and those from Caucasus and Central Asia were not available in the needed numbers before these regions had been conquered.

Napoleon's army had been getting its horses from the conquered territories (Germany being one of them and it was producing very good horses fit for the military service) and the main reason for him not pursuing the defeated enemy energetically enough in 1813 was not as much an absence of the horses (if it existed) but a general inexperience and ill-preparedness of his newly raised troops: the boys had been called to the service and they simply did not have enough stamina to perform the same way as the grown-ups..
 
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