Post by eurofed on Oct 15, 2017 17:58:00 GMT
What follows is my own collection of plausible ideas on how Napoleon could have possibly improved the fortunes of the First French Empire and its European hegemony, assembled in one scenario and semi-coherent strategy.
- His domestic policies get to be a little more liberal: the Constitution of the French Empire incorporates the liberal amendments he enacted IOTL during the Hundred Days.
- He realizes he needs to pre-emptively wipe out Prussia and Austria off the map, since the Hohenzollern and the Habsburg shall never collaborate in good faith even if humbled and shall undermine and betray him as soon as his back is turned. Furthermore he realizes he has to give some satisfaction to the national aspirations of the Germans and the Italians. So he dismantles and partitions Prussia and Austria after he crushes them on the battlefield and occupies their territory in 1805-10. He sets up a Kingdom of Westphalia with himself on the throne which annexes most of northern Germany, including Westphalia, Hanover, Brandenburg, Silesia, and Pomerania. The Duchy of Warsaw gets East Prussia and the Prussian and Austrian partitions of Poland. Saxony gets Bohemia-Moravia. Bavaria gets Austria proper. Hungary is set up as an 'independent' client state of France with a member of the Magyar high nobility on the throne. The Kingdom of Italy annexes most of northern Italy, including Lombardy, Venetia, Parma, Modena, Lucca, Tuscany, and the Papal States. It also gets the Illyrian Provinces. Switzerland is partitioned between France, Italy, and Germany.
- Napoleon crowns himself Emperor of the French, Germans, and Italians. The German and Italian states are merged into Federations that get constitutions broadly similar to the French model, except for their federal character that is broadly similar to OTL German Empire. Member states get similar constitutions, too. France, Germany, and Italy form an European Confederation with a common monarch, separate parliaments, and a common government to deal with issues such as finance, defence, and foreign policy. Napoleon limits direct French annexations to the territories deemed politically necessary to fulfill French nationalist ambitions for 'natural borders' or the acquisitions more or less established before his takeover, such as the Low Countries, the Left Bank of the Rhine, western Switzerland, and Piedmont. Theoretically speaking, the less non-French-speaking territory put under direct French rule, the better for the long-term stability of the empire, although there are probably limits to how much even a foresighted Napoleon would be realistically able or willing to frustrate the expansionist appetites of France to appease the other nationalities of the empire. Outlandish stuff such as annexing half of northwestern Germany or half of northern Italy should be easy to avoid, however.
- He comes to realize continental blockade of British trade won't really work as a way to bring Britain to its knees, at least until European industry isn't able to replace British goods, and trying to enforce it shall buy him more enemies than it is worth. So he organizes his empire in a continental trading bloc that imposes a heavy tariff on British trade and subsidizes European industry but doesn't try to keep all of Europe from trading with Britain at all. He realizes in order to beat Britain he has to play the long game, crush all allies of the British on the continent until there none left, make Europe as economically self-sufficient as possible, and gradually rebuild European naval power to match the Royal Navy.
- He offers Russia a division of Europe and the Near East in spheres of influence, with the Russians getting everything east of the Vistula and south of the Carpathians, and French strategic cooperation for dismantlement of the Ottoman Empire. If Russia accepts the deal, he honors it and doesn't care too much if the Russians keep trading with Britain. If it doesn't, he adopts a defensive maneuver strategy in Eastern Europe, possibly combined with limited offensive thrusts in Russian territory if backed by an efficient logistic chain, and he keeps smashing Russian army after Russian army from a favorable strategic position until the Tsar accepts peace on his terms. An all-out invasion of Russia does not occur, if another war with the Russians happens because the Tsar initiates it, Napoleon fights it much the same way he fought the War of the Fourth Coalition.
- He doesn't mess with the government of Spain unless Spain openly turns hostile to his hegemony or breaks down into chaos. If such middle states as Portugal or Sweden turn hostile and side with Britain, he defeats them in cooperation with allies (Spain, Denmark, possibly Russia) and gives control of them to his clients (Portugal to Spain, Norway and Sweden to Denmark, possibly Finland to Russia). As a result, the Peninsular War (apart possibly from invasion of Portugal) does not take place, and Napoleon uses the spared military resources to dismantle Prussia and Austria and force Russia to accept his preferred kind of peace. He may give the Russians military support against the Ottomans if they turn friendly, but lets them do the bulk of the effort.
- As a separate, independent PoD, the USA got the Canadian colonies as a result of the ARW. The War of 1812 may well get averted since the USA already owns settled Canada, the British are not in a strategic position to organize the Natives against the Americans or keep a reliable, worthwhile hold on western Canada against US penetration (sooner rather than later they shall sell Rupert's Land and the Pacific Northwest to the USA rather than inevitably lose them to American colonization), and the different trade policy of the Napoleonic Empire may make the British blockade policy turn different. On the other hand, the impressment and British blockade issues may well cause it to occur all the same. If it does, different circumstances all but surely turn it into an unconclusive 'wolf vs. whale' strategic stalemate which ends in a white peace. Napoleon sells Louisiana to the USA much the same way as OTL.
- Napoleon divorces Josephine to get an heir soon after he becomes Emperor, but does not marry a princess of the hostile and eventually deposed Habsburg. He instead marries Augusta of Bavaria (who married his stepson IOTL), or less likely Anna Pavlovna of Russia (if the Russians eventually accept the match).
- His domestic policies get to be a little more liberal: the Constitution of the French Empire incorporates the liberal amendments he enacted IOTL during the Hundred Days.
- He realizes he needs to pre-emptively wipe out Prussia and Austria off the map, since the Hohenzollern and the Habsburg shall never collaborate in good faith even if humbled and shall undermine and betray him as soon as his back is turned. Furthermore he realizes he has to give some satisfaction to the national aspirations of the Germans and the Italians. So he dismantles and partitions Prussia and Austria after he crushes them on the battlefield and occupies their territory in 1805-10. He sets up a Kingdom of Westphalia with himself on the throne which annexes most of northern Germany, including Westphalia, Hanover, Brandenburg, Silesia, and Pomerania. The Duchy of Warsaw gets East Prussia and the Prussian and Austrian partitions of Poland. Saxony gets Bohemia-Moravia. Bavaria gets Austria proper. Hungary is set up as an 'independent' client state of France with a member of the Magyar high nobility on the throne. The Kingdom of Italy annexes most of northern Italy, including Lombardy, Venetia, Parma, Modena, Lucca, Tuscany, and the Papal States. It also gets the Illyrian Provinces. Switzerland is partitioned between France, Italy, and Germany.
- Napoleon crowns himself Emperor of the French, Germans, and Italians. The German and Italian states are merged into Federations that get constitutions broadly similar to the French model, except for their federal character that is broadly similar to OTL German Empire. Member states get similar constitutions, too. France, Germany, and Italy form an European Confederation with a common monarch, separate parliaments, and a common government to deal with issues such as finance, defence, and foreign policy. Napoleon limits direct French annexations to the territories deemed politically necessary to fulfill French nationalist ambitions for 'natural borders' or the acquisitions more or less established before his takeover, such as the Low Countries, the Left Bank of the Rhine, western Switzerland, and Piedmont. Theoretically speaking, the less non-French-speaking territory put under direct French rule, the better for the long-term stability of the empire, although there are probably limits to how much even a foresighted Napoleon would be realistically able or willing to frustrate the expansionist appetites of France to appease the other nationalities of the empire. Outlandish stuff such as annexing half of northwestern Germany or half of northern Italy should be easy to avoid, however.
- He comes to realize continental blockade of British trade won't really work as a way to bring Britain to its knees, at least until European industry isn't able to replace British goods, and trying to enforce it shall buy him more enemies than it is worth. So he organizes his empire in a continental trading bloc that imposes a heavy tariff on British trade and subsidizes European industry but doesn't try to keep all of Europe from trading with Britain at all. He realizes in order to beat Britain he has to play the long game, crush all allies of the British on the continent until there none left, make Europe as economically self-sufficient as possible, and gradually rebuild European naval power to match the Royal Navy.
- He offers Russia a division of Europe and the Near East in spheres of influence, with the Russians getting everything east of the Vistula and south of the Carpathians, and French strategic cooperation for dismantlement of the Ottoman Empire. If Russia accepts the deal, he honors it and doesn't care too much if the Russians keep trading with Britain. If it doesn't, he adopts a defensive maneuver strategy in Eastern Europe, possibly combined with limited offensive thrusts in Russian territory if backed by an efficient logistic chain, and he keeps smashing Russian army after Russian army from a favorable strategic position until the Tsar accepts peace on his terms. An all-out invasion of Russia does not occur, if another war with the Russians happens because the Tsar initiates it, Napoleon fights it much the same way he fought the War of the Fourth Coalition.
- He doesn't mess with the government of Spain unless Spain openly turns hostile to his hegemony or breaks down into chaos. If such middle states as Portugal or Sweden turn hostile and side with Britain, he defeats them in cooperation with allies (Spain, Denmark, possibly Russia) and gives control of them to his clients (Portugal to Spain, Norway and Sweden to Denmark, possibly Finland to Russia). As a result, the Peninsular War (apart possibly from invasion of Portugal) does not take place, and Napoleon uses the spared military resources to dismantle Prussia and Austria and force Russia to accept his preferred kind of peace. He may give the Russians military support against the Ottomans if they turn friendly, but lets them do the bulk of the effort.
- As a separate, independent PoD, the USA got the Canadian colonies as a result of the ARW. The War of 1812 may well get averted since the USA already owns settled Canada, the British are not in a strategic position to organize the Natives against the Americans or keep a reliable, worthwhile hold on western Canada against US penetration (sooner rather than later they shall sell Rupert's Land and the Pacific Northwest to the USA rather than inevitably lose them to American colonization), and the different trade policy of the Napoleonic Empire may make the British blockade policy turn different. On the other hand, the impressment and British blockade issues may well cause it to occur all the same. If it does, different circumstances all but surely turn it into an unconclusive 'wolf vs. whale' strategic stalemate which ends in a white peace. Napoleon sells Louisiana to the USA much the same way as OTL.
- Napoleon divorces Josephine to get an heir soon after he becomes Emperor, but does not marry a princess of the hostile and eventually deposed Habsburg. He instead marries Augusta of Bavaria (who married his stepson IOTL), or less likely Anna Pavlovna of Russia (if the Russians eventually accept the match).
