How did Napoleon Lose Waterloo? (ft. AltHistoryHub) | Animated History

before we begin I want to thank our sponsor Nord VPN for making this video possible if you're like me and spend a huge chunk of your time on the internet doing extremely important things then you know that protecting your data is crucial Nord VPN keeps your personal data safe with over 5,200 servers in 62 countries you can connect to a server just about anywhere on the globe in addition to protecting your data Nord VPN gives you access to websites and videos that are blocked in your country say it's 3:00 a.m. and you've got class tomorrow but who cares history is boring anyways and you want to watch my strange addiction North Korea edition but your imperialist American IP address prevents you from seeing the glorious leader in action well if you had Nord VPN this wouldn't be a problem for the low price of only $2.99 a month Nord VPN will keep your online data secure on your PC phone and tablet sign up using the link in the description below which grants you 75% off plus another month free if you use my promo code history this video was made in collaboration with cody from alternate history hub he released a video on what would happen if Napoleon 1 Waterloo and stayed in power check out that video after watching hi I'm Griffin Johnson the armchair historian today's video the final defeat of Napoleon's career and how it could have been avoided located in the South Atlantic Ocean the island of st. Helena was remote unpleasantly humid and perpetually damp here a man who had once conquered a continent and terrified the world was stuck in the deteriorating Longwood house a far cry from the palaces he once resided in he spent days reading writing about the great heroes he admired and sharing tales of his fascinating life with the throngs of visitors that made the journey to see him many afternoons were spent brooding about the 18th of June 1815 day that he the first emperor of the French was beaten one final time [Applause] [Music] [Music] on a handful of ridges near Brussels the hundred days period came to a close and to the seventh coalition was victorious Napoleon's fleeting restoration ended just four days later and with it his dream of ruling France but could this disastrous failure have been avoided or was his fate sealed before the first shots were even fired and today's historical analysis we're looking at whether or not Napoleon could have won at Waterloo impossible is reward to be found only in the dictionary of fools [Music] after doing the impossible and bloodlessly reassuming power napoleon was already back on the offensive having just won a strategic victory at cuatro bra against the british and what would be his final victory at Ligny against the Prussians he was on the move toward the site that would reverberate in his mind forever Waterloo the reinvigorated Grand Army that Napoleon mustered consisted of about 72,000 men 14,000 of whom were cavalry unsurprisingly given his fondness of artillery Napoleon fielded an impressive 250 cannon a full 60% more than the British the coalition army under Arthur Wellesley the first Duke of Wellington consisted of 68,000 men about 11,000 of which were cavalry and 150 cannon finally the Prussians under GERD von blücher arrived later in the battle and had a total of 48 thousand men about 7,000 of whom were cavalry and approximately 130 for cannon on paper Napoleon held a clear advantage he had more men who were generally better trained and who more experienced than their opponents and more firepower furthermore as Wellington himself said while eating breakfast during the morning of the battle Napoleon's presence on the battlefield was worth 40,000 men but while Napoleon's troops were of higher quality his officer corps left much to be desired a serious brain drain among the higher ranks affected the French forces at Waterloo and many officers were assigned command of unfamiliar units upon arrival to the battle even the best soldiers are ineffective when they lack direction so how did things shake out well you guys know had it not been for the desertion of a traitor I should have unhit lated the enemy at the opening of the campaign I should have destroyed him Malini if my left had done its duty I should have destroyed him again our Waterloo if my right had not failed me before the battle began the Duke of Wellington went to work fortifying the position where he would meet the French using the reverse slopes just outside the town of Waterloo he was able to conceal many of his troops while fortifying three major defensible positions these included the Chateau Hyuga mall to the west and the Papillon farm to the east which he intended to garrison as an anchor on either flank in the center lay LaHaye sankt farmhouse and an adjacent sandpit if all went as planned Napoleon's flanks would be vulnerable no matter which position they attacked despite this Geographic disadvantage the Emperor of the French believed that victory was assured however the most dangerous threat to Napoleon was the proximity of the Prussian troops who helped to bolster Wellington's eastern flank in order to delay their arrival napoleon dispatched marshal emmanuel duke russia with approximately 34,000 men nearly 1/3 of his total strength to harass them thereby buying himself enough time to face one enemy at a time the decision was not a bad one but a torrential rainstorm on the 17th delayed the French response Napoleon consequently postponed the attack until midday on the 18th as to give the ground the time to dry perhaps miss calculating how long it would take the Prussians to arrive when the battle properly began around noon the French infantry began their feint attack on huge amol an important communications hub what should have been nearly the opening stroke before an assault on the enemy center became a brutal as Napoleon sent leave after wave of men against the chateau the British garrison held fast without drawing a significant number of reinforcements from the centre furthermore hiding behind the reverse slopes made Wellington troops all but involve all two artillery fire though he had more men and perhaps could have overwhelmed the British eventually time was not on Napoleon side around 1:00 p.m. a massive troops appeared in the distance finally grew she was arriving oh wait that's the Prussians Napoleon's worst fear had now materialized he would have to move fast or risk being overwhelmed a dispatch was quickly sent to Russia ordering him to return to the main army but he never did for disputed reasons his initial orders had been to pursue the Prussians and keep them at bay battling the third Corps in the afternoon the loyal general was following his Emperor's orders to the letter well not quite to the letter he failed miserably to pin the Prussians down it was his only job he was too busy fighting a small contingent while the rest of blue-cheese horses bore down on the increasingly beleaguered french army their arrival to the battlefield was slow however and Napoleon with his unwavering sense of optimism still believed today his optimism wasn't entirely ill-founded after two brigades of British heavy cavalry among them the infamously Cavalier Scots greys attacked the French they were then caught in a counter-attack by the French Kuras ears and Lancers the Scots greys were essentially destroyed as a results along with many of the other regiments to me to Perdition forgets to hinder the prussian advance Napoleon set up a cavalry screen supported by a corps of infantry he then shifted his attention from Hyuga mall to the Allied centre at LaHaye st. - brigades of infantry under the audacious marshal Michel ney attacked the farmhouse but were repeatedly repulsed when he mistakenly believed that he saw a break in the British line ney ordered a massive cavalry charge three divisions of French cavalry smashed into the eye in front as a result of mais carelessness straight into anti cavalry square [Applause] by 6:00 p.m. these mounted units have been completely depleted but a 6,000 yen infantry advanced managed to secure the position after heavy fighting from their hard-fought position French artillery chewed through the Allied center devastating Wellington's command post and for a moment it seems that victory was within Napoleon's grasp so long as nay could get some reinforcements from the Imperial Guard held in reserve but Napoleon refused to give up the forces he was using to secure his flank against the Russians who had been advancing while ney launched one more wasteful cavalry attack after the next with more Prussians arriving and the French flank finally collapsing utterly demoralized after the young guard had been beaten back the Emperor was forced to deploy his old guard a card that should have been played much earlier by then even the old guard consisting of France's finest troops seasoned veterans of numerous campaigns could not turn the tide they would rather die than surrender by 9:00 p.m. it was all over four days later Napoleon abdicated the imperial throne the hundred days were at an end [Music] in 1815 i relinquished the anticipation of ultimate success i lost my first confidence perhaps I found that I was wearing beyond the time of life I which fortune usually proves favourable or perhaps dispelled that I hung over my miracle Asturia was broken now that we've summarized the course of this historic battle it's time to return to our original question was its outcome avoidable first let me step out of my armchair historian roll and get ready for some armchair general ship much better there's a handful of moments in the battle that are easy to point to as potentially fatal mistakes nay and Grucci are often targets for blame and have gotten their share of it over the years Russia was undeniably outplayed by the Prussians and if he had more effectively delayed them or had been able to respond more rapidly to the order recalling him to the battlefield of Waterloo events may have transpired differently as for ney his numerous attacks on the British line were unnecessarily costly he through repeated cavalry charges against the British infantry while they were in square formation although the French displayed true heroism during these charges they may as well have been falling on their own swords an earlier combined-arms attack that employed artillery and cavalry more effectively may have gone a long way the possible permutations here especially if we take earlier battles in the campaign into account are nearly endless and there's plenty of blame to go around historian Adams Amoy ski in his biography Napoleon a life suggests at la petit Caporal might have just lost his touch he says the younger Napoleon would have tied Wellington down head-on and outflanked him pinning him in a trap of his own making then a point of old probably also would have been willing to dispatch the old guard to help secure naze position on the case ain't and he might have not devoted so much manpower to attacking Hyuga mon which although an important position was not worth the price paid Napoleon has also been criticized for needlessly waiting for the ground to dry before attacking the British but the trade-off would of course be delayed movement of mounted and artillery units these strategic blunders were compounded on a tactical level by the decision to organize many of the men into closed columns which despite demoralizing the enemy did not constitute the most effective option for maximizing firepower I'm told Bonaparte gave two reasons for his failure Grucci failing and checking the Prussians and his great charge of cavalry being made half an hour too soon to us at the armchair historian Napoleon could very well have won at Waterloo if he had prioritized breaking the British centre line rather than wasting lives on taking human the Imperial Guard should have been deployed as early as possible to reinforce an attack on the British center in addition ney should have never been given free rein to deplete the French cavalry division's in Russia we've talked enough about Russia joining me now is Cody from alternate history hub to talk a bit about how Napoleon could have achieved victory on a strategic level it seems to me that the best way Napoleon could have fended off the 7th coalition was to avoid embarking on the Waterloo campaign entirely upon Napoleon's return it was immediately clear that a new coalition would form and resist him with the same tenaciousness as before he could have fought defensively given himself time to recreate the army he had fielded in his first reign at the cost of public support although its offensive strategy more in line with the six days campaign which took place just one year prior may have been better suited to repelling the 7th coalition winning this war would likely be the greatest challenge of Napoleon's life regardless of whether he stood a chance or not defensively or otherwise the emperor opted for a much more aggressive course of action now known the history as the Waterloo campaign it is ironic that given how much of his success on and off the battlefield was the result of bold maneuvering Napoleon's final display of audaciousness in pursuing this strategy may have been the one to doom him yet on the day of the battle itself that bold decisiveness seemed to have been absent Napoleon could have won the Battle of Waterloo but probably not the Napoleon who is present the man who lost to Wellington that day bore more resemblance to the one who would die on st. Helena in 1821 and the one coronated in 1804 you

Channel: undefined

Views: 812,836

Rating: 4.8953304 out of 5

Keywords: Waterloo, Napoleon Bonaparte, Duke of Wellington, The Battle of Waterloo, Battle of Ligny, Battle of Quatre Bras, The Napoleonic Wars, History of Napoleon, The Seventh Coalition, Hundred Days Campaign, Grouchy, Gebhard von Blucher, Arthur Wellesley, Charge of the Scots Greys, 1700's History, Animated History, War History, Military History, Battle of Waterloo

Id: OE_dtHRITY8

Length: 16min 28sec (988 seconds)

Published: Sat Aug 03 2019