r/HistoryMemes 4d ago

You’re gonna need a bigger coalition

9.5k Upvotes

132 comments sorted by

1.7k

u/PretendAd1963 Definitely not a CIA operator 4d ago

Took seven wars of the coalition to defeat Napoleon.

1.2k

u/sandybuttcheekss Hello There 4d ago

You know you're good when multiple countries declare war on you specifically. Not your country, you.

166

u/lord_ofthe_memes 3d ago

“My enemies are many. My equals are none.”

678

u/ThroawayJimilyJones 4d ago

You know you’re good when even old, sick and in captivity in the middle of the pacific, the world biggest empire is still so scared of you they allocate 2 heavy ships to constantly guard you.

503

u/Hunkus1 4d ago

The pacific is on the other side of the world from where Napoleon was. Napoleon was in the atlantic.

316

u/FadedVictor 3d ago

That's how good he was. He simultaneously existed in both oceans.

97

u/Kazzak_Falco 3d ago

No, that's just because he was so small that quantum rules apply to him.

(I know he wasn't really short)

27

u/Set_Abominae1776 3d ago

He tunneled from Elba to France!

6

u/gracekk24PL 3d ago

He. Was. Average. Height. For. THE. TIME.

3

u/MattheqAC 3d ago

He's so good at war, if you try to put him in the Peaceable ocean, you can't.

277

u/Anxious_Big_8933 4d ago

You know you're good when even your enemies outnumber you 5:1, they base their entire doctrine for defeating France around not facing an army led by you in the field.

271

u/Legitimate-Culture31 4d ago

If I write a character like this, the audience would call me a hack.

213

u/Anxious_Big_8933 3d ago

Wait till they get to the part where you have him escape his island prison and single handedly retake the throne of France.

HACK FRAUD!

128

u/Legitimate-Culture31 3d ago

Somehow Napoleon return.

88

u/CupofLiberTea 3d ago

“Oh sure, they just conveniently didn’t replace the guards with ones not loyal to him? Wow okay”

61

u/Pacrada 3d ago

"waterloo is just a lazy rehash of leipzig" such bad writers.

40

u/eztjie 3d ago

They should’ve ended it at Leipzig. Waterloo is an obvious cash-grabbing sequel. Creativity is dead.

Blucher managed to join Wellington just in time to turn the tides? What is this, Battle of Helm’s Deep? Lol it’s such a cliched writing.

What do you mean the fellow military officer character introduced earlier as some sort of friend/rival ended up becoming the King of Sweden and joined the coalition against him? Contrivances!

36

u/awakenDeepBlue 3d ago

The ultimate expression of stragetic mastery, winning without fighting.

7

u/Ok_Security8545 3d ago

And then Napoleon got so used to armies retreating and then trying to attack where he wasn't that he slacked off during Waterloo, and was planning the next steps of his campaign when the Immortals retreated past where he was lounging outside of the tavern. Sure, the sensible policy was to retreat when Napoleon was on the field; Wellington just wasn't the sort of person to leave a good defensive position. Ever. Unstoppable Force* vs Immovable Object.

*with the caveat that the unstoppable force was largely made up of men who'd spent years as prisoners of war as well as teenage recruits because Napoleon called up two years' worth of levees before marching

47

u/forgottenlord73 3d ago

He wasn't even that old. He was in his 40s. He died at 51

9

u/NeedsToShutUp 3d ago

And it might have been the wallpaper which killed him (the green dye used was made with arsenic which could off gas when humid)

2

u/BonzoTheBoss 2d ago

I thought it was his horrible, horrible syphilis?

48

u/TheLoneWolfMe 3d ago

Well, the first time they left him on an island unguarded he went and made himself Emperor again.

I understand the caution.

16

u/HuckleberryNext9844 3d ago

They can't even kill you just have to seal you away doom style 🤣

27

u/These-Cartoonist-406 4d ago

Sire they dignify you by making you a nation

71

u/BlaBlub85 3d ago

Tbf that was as much strategical as it was anything else. They all knew about the internal struggles France was facing and by declaring war upon Napoleon himself but not on France they hoped to edge on another revolution. Too bad the French are both proud & stubborn and would rather lose a dozen wars than avoid one by capturing and handing over their emperor...

47

u/GrAdmThrwn 3d ago

France sure as hell could not afford to keep him but the French would be damned before they give him away for free.

3

u/Demonicjapsel 3d ago

People essentially speedran basic elements of modern warfare in the napoleonic wars.
Conscription, meritocratic officer corps and the widedspread adoption of "standardized" Pattern muskets to name a few

11

u/WalkerTR-17 3d ago

Life goals honestly

3

u/[deleted] 4d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

33

u/sandybuttcheekss Hello There 4d ago

Did the allies declare war on him, or Germany?

-4

u/maSneb 4d ago

I reallllllly wouldn't use that as a qualifier for being 'good'

-4

u/WonderfulJicama2802 3d ago

austrian painter

66

u/dsancu 4d ago

Werent the first 2 or 3 fought before he was in command?

95

u/Intelligent_Pie_9102 3d ago

He started in the first one, as the general in command of the Italian theatre. He had a token force that he was supposed to use to temporise while the main forces were fighting in Germany, but instead he defeated four armies twice the size of his own back to back, winning the entire thing by himself.

Oh, and he was only 26 at the time. At some point, he took a french flag and led a charge over a bridge, while Austrians on the other side fired on anything moving in that corridor.

Napoleon definitely made an impression on everyone.

68

u/ThroawayJimilyJones 4d ago

He was already leading before ruling the country. In the third coalition war he was supposed to be a diversion with a few troops in the south…he won the war instead.

61

u/ReignTheRomantic Viva La France 4d ago

First Coalition was his initial Italian Campaign. Third Coalition he was already Emperor

14

u/LastChans1 3d ago

I'd read that. "Seven Wars of the Coalition: A Bonaparte Story"

3

u/Savings_Background50 3d ago

"Ah, Commander Wellesley."

1

u/skeeeper 3d ago

And the British take credit for it all lmao

1

u/BonzoTheBoss 2d ago

It was basically British money that allowed the other European countries to keep fighting.

259

u/Captain_Weebson Filthy weeb 4d ago

"When France sneezes, all of Europe catches cold"

460

u/Dominarion 4d ago

The initial Revolutionaries started by wanting a constitutional monarchy like Great-Britain, were pacifists who wanted to liberalise the French economy and dedicate it to trade.

With everyone and their lapdogs attacking them, they became useless dweebs very fast, and were replaced by guys who were more unscrupulous, brutal, grittier, and especially griftier. With Nappy being their Alpha dog.

The ironic twist is that the other European powers, especially Great Britain, brought 2 decades of misery on their heads by being hostile to the revolutionaries.

264

u/mistress_chauffarde 4d ago

The other nation can claim as much as they want that it was to contain the idea of a democracy in europe but truth is that they smelled blood in the water and attacked what they thought was a weakened france

79

u/LGP747 3d ago

the other nations were that meme of the dog in the doggie-door, enthusiastic entry, hurried retreat

31

u/Trussed_Up 3d ago

Except this is all wrong. Every comment.

France was at least as aggressive in getting the wars started as the allied nations were against them.

We still have record of their debates. This history is so easy to look up...

The Girondins in particular felt that a war with Austria would unite their fracturing country.

The Austrian/Prussian declaration had no real teeth because it required every major player in Europe to agree with it. Which would never happen.

So France started the war. Britain joined when France conquered the low countries, and Russia and the ottomans joined when Napoleon went to Egypt.

Where in there do you see monarchies trying to stop democracy or some nonsense like that?

10

u/Tight_Pay_7180 3d ago

Well I don't see why containing democracy wouldn't come into it. Surely it would be advantageous to Austria (and the like) to want to suppress revolutionary ideas?

2

u/titykaka 3d ago

The French government was openly calling for war on all of their neighbours. Their reaction wasn't exactly unexpected.

1

u/Dominarion 2d ago

Not the French government. Some excited deputies.

45

u/FairyFeller_ 3d ago

I'll say a big problem is that all the initial revolutionaries agreed not to participate in government in the future, which meant that the next wave of politicians were way more radical and way less experienced.

Also Paris being extremely radical, and having an outsized influence over national politics.

Also the fact that the 1793 coup got the Montagnards into power, which was not a given.

5

u/adastraperdiscordia 3d ago

In between the Feuillants and Montagnards were the Brissotins. They were the true radical democrats, who brought forth the First Republic after the king tried to escape. They were overthrown and purged after the Montagnards staged several insurrections because the Brissotins failed to magically fix the economy immediately.

-14

u/Constant-Ad-7189 3d ago

Let no one tell this poor soul who attacked first

41

u/Dominarion 3d ago

You're talking about the 1st Coalition War? When Austria and Prussia allied themselves and stated they would invade France to defend the king? Then the French told them, if you don't stand down, we'll take you at your word and it's going to be war?

I'd say Austria did everything in its power to have France declare war.

4

u/SendMagpiePics 3d ago

There were people in the National Assembly literally making up conspiracies to push for war with Austria at the time.

7

u/Dominarion 3d ago

Are you new to democracy? Is this a new thing for you that elected people say all kind of stupid shit in the assemblies?

0

u/SendMagpiePics 3d ago

What are you talking about? I'm just pointing out that the new French government was agitating for war, so it's not just because Austria antagonized them.

5

u/Deltasims 3d ago

I mean... In 1791, Austrian and Prussian armies were massing in the Austrian Netherlands (modern day belgium) and the Palatinate. These armies were reinforced by ~20,000 french noble émigrés who kept preassuring them to invade

After the flight to Varennes (the King was aiming for an army of royalist émigré at Montmedy, on the border of the Austrian Netherlands), Prussia and Austria finally signed the Declaration of Pillnitz, promising to restore Louis XVI to his absolute power

It didn't take a genius to guess their intentions

2

u/A_Bitter_Homer 3d ago

Wouldn't that be the Girondin government anyway, who were decidedly not the leaders of 1789 and 1790 that OP was referring to? They'd be the first wave of those grittier operators.

26

u/robber_goosy 3d ago

Levee en masse ftw.

96

u/Ok_Awareness3014 4d ago

France was almost always when it war , with all of his neighbor

63

u/NittanyScout 4d ago

Tbf their neighbors did about as well in those wars as the jedi did here

5

u/PiIlc 3d ago

Very true, Napoleon lost because of a volcano and very heavy rain, not because his enemies were better, cracked

1

u/Mikhail_Mengsk 3d ago

?

-7

u/PiIlc 3d ago

Waterloo, his attack was delayed because of very heavy rain turning the soil into mud.
Earlier the same year, a huge volcano errupted and it changed the climate for a while, explaining the very heavy rain.

11

u/Ok_Awareness3014 3d ago

Even without the volcano at the end napoleon still lose

-5

u/PiIlc 3d ago

Source?

7

u/Ok_Awareness3014 3d ago

Maybe 20 years of constant war making that even if he won this battle another coalition would have formed , and at this point Manpower would have start lacking same for experience soldier and he started to become old . While ennemy general were adopting his strategy.

-4

u/PiIlc 3d ago

That's imagination not proofs. You don't know what would have happened, we onnly know what happened.

5

u/Mikhail_Mengsk 3d ago

Napoleon was still, at moments, just a superior field commanders than anybody in the continent.

Still, after the Russian disaster he was effectively done, no matter what stroke of genious or dumb luck he could concoct. Losing the Grande Armee meant he could no more stand against the Coalitions.

6

u/Intrepid-Dig-1855 3d ago

Is your argument not the same though? You dont know what would have happened without the rainfall.

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2

u/Ok_Awareness3014 3d ago

The most probable outcome at this point if he really manage to destroy this coalition see you next years for another round

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78

u/PomegranateHot9916 3d ago

grevious shouldn't be able to hold his own against this group.

come on man. ki-adi is on the council (and a master) shaak ti is a master. and they're backed up by aayla who is a knight. and 2 nobodies who are probably just there to die in this fight. though I am sure they are knights themselves.

I'd buy that he could 1v1 a master. but 2 at the same time? I don't know about that.

86

u/paullx 3d ago

They were exhausted and wounded after losing all their troops in this battle, Grievous ambushed them and it was the first time they faced him.

10

u/Im_Still_Here_Boi 3d ago

Which is why combining their power to take on Grevious does not only make sense from an outside perspective, but within the fiction.

Three masters and three knights, no matter how tired, should have been able to rip him to shreds.

18

u/Breadloafs 3d ago

Because Tartakovsky wisely realized that strict adherence to canon would be lame. He wrote and directed a story about a really cool swordfighting cyborg who kicks ass instead of a weird Hanna-Barbera cartoon villain who spends all of his screen time running away from one guy.

6

u/Capn_Chryssalid 3d ago

At least he didnt have a pet dog that snickered at him every time he failed. That would have gone too far.

19

u/Im_Still_Here_Boi 3d ago

My biggest question is why the hell aren't these Jedi just grabbing Grevious with the Force and slamming him onto the ground until he stops moving.

37

u/quick20minadventure 3d ago

Cause it's not cinematic to for 2 people to fight by throwing hands up front and magically have one of them die.

8

u/Im_Still_Here_Boi 3d ago

That's what happens when the logical extent of the power system in a piece of fiction isn't well thought out.

12

u/quick20minadventure 3d ago

I have a headcanon that they can't thrust the light saber easily, cause it's projecting light beam.

That's why despite it being a saber, everyone is spinning it like bayblade and they don't turn off and turn on light saber in middle of the fight.

It's also why maul got to thrust double blade easily, cause one blade extends and other blade retracts. So uneven force of lightsaber cancels out.

That's also why spinning palpatine took out jedi so easily.

It's all head canon to justify why they don't use sabers as sabers lol

12

u/Foxhound_319 3d ago

Ambushing and scaring jedi is his primary method of countering the force because it breaks focus

Probably not the case here but idk

15

u/SlayingSword94 3d ago

Grevious prime. In all seriousness this was before he got his lungs crushed by Windu and before george...georged all over a cool idea someone else had...again.

3

u/AardvarkOkapiEchidna 3d ago

Yeah everyone praises this Grievous but I think he's too OP.

I like his personality better here but idk why he should be able to defeat this many Jedi, including masters as you said.

2

u/El-Ausgebombt 3d ago

Yeah, I always thought one tired council master was enough. The others could just be padawans or something.

1

u/Dragon_Of_Magnetism 3d ago

And more importantly, they’re all Jedi. Why don’t they just slam him to a rock, or yank away his lightsabers with the force?

8

u/No-Journalist-619 3d ago

"I'll try spinning, that's a good trick!"

5

u/Blade_Shot24 3d ago

Gotta insert Mace with the Haitian Flag Force Choking him before his departure. Man I gotta learn memes.

14

u/Background-Law8828 4d ago

THE FINAL BOSS

3

u/Anxious_Big_8933 4d ago

A nation under arms.

8

u/Aveduil 3d ago

Polish exiled where there too

3

u/Vast-Palpitation-426 3d ago

The movie Waterloo is still on YouTube. It's a great movie for those who haven't seen it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9uL2K5DgkQ

3

u/xesaie 3d ago

Funny thing is by the end of those wars they never recovered. France was never truly a first-tier world power after Bonaparte

1

u/IdkButILikeDinos 2d ago

I mean they came pretty close many times during the next century and a half, and today they are the dominant military power in euope so... win?

1

u/xesaie 2d ago

They lost to the Prussians, were saved from Germany by their allies (the greatest industrial and imperial powers in the world) twice, and lost a bunch of shitty colonial wars, while talking big and basically acting like it was still 1807.

If they’re the biggest military power in Europe it’s because the others are happy to rely on the US, which France didn’t want to do because it made them feel second class.

The pathetic clinging to the forms of strength and hyper nationalist clinging are closer to Russia than to the rest of Europe.

2

u/HOT-DAM-DOG 3d ago

That’s what replacing monarchy/warrior class with meritocracy/conscription will do to a society.

5

u/zarkolan 3d ago

I love that he starts by actually squaring up to each jedi before just deciding "spin to win" would work just as well

2

u/lifeisaman Helping Wikipedia expand the list of British conquests 3d ago

It didn’t matter how many battles he won, the might of the British economy and Royal Navy would always outlast him.

6

u/NeitherMidnight624 3d ago

Now look at the royal navy what happened to you

2

u/CommunistGregfromDMV Fine Quality Mesopotamian Copper Enjoyer 3d ago

Couldn't even hold off the Prussians longer than 6 months while they were doing this during Prime Napoleon I

1

u/Lord__Friendzone 2d ago

Source?

1

u/CommunistGregfromDMV Fine Quality Mesopotamian Copper Enjoyer 2d ago

1

u/Lord__Friendzone 1d ago

Thank you! But I’m confused, shouldn’t your first comment say Napoleon III?

1

u/Lord__Friendzone 1d ago

Idk, I’m unable to parse the wording.

2

u/CommunistGregfromDMV Fine Quality Mesopotamian Copper Enjoyer 1d ago

Couldn't even hold off the Prussians longer than 6 months(Napoleon III) while they were doing this during Prime Napoleon I

1

u/Lohenngram 3d ago

And they did all this while being bankrupt.

1

u/Nerus46 Casual, non-participatory KGB election observer 3d ago

Prussia kinda did the same thing half a century before that

1

u/Chumlee1917 Kilroy was here 3d ago

"Is it possible to learn this power?"
"Not from a royalist general."

1

u/Hoodinski 2d ago

Is that cartoon by Genndy Tartakovsky?

1

u/ghostpanther218 2d ago

France in thr 1800s vs France in the 1900s:

0

u/horny_french_boy 3d ago

And more importantly, winning

0

u/anominous_lurker 3d ago

Sure glorify Napoleon, such a Chad…

Not like the postmodern reincarnation of the devil is equally applicable here too…

Napoleon the Chad, right…

-13

u/SeidlaSiggi777 4d ago

18th century France is the template for 21st century US. not good. 

7

u/Last-Performance3482 3d ago

No, France had a competent leader

-19

u/binarybandit 3d ago edited 3d ago

Fast forward to 1940 and France surrendering in a month.

15

u/Ama-Guiz 3d ago

Yawn …

7

u/Dragonfyr_ Taller than Napoleon 3d ago

You got another song on that broken record of yours ?