How was Napleonic warfare different from the rest of 18th century warfare?

How was Napleonic warfare different from the rest of 18th century warfare?

Napoleon began employing artillery and light infantry tactics on a scale never seen before. That was the main difference.

Column foramtions were more widley used, light infantry tactics became more adavcned, artillery was used more concentrated, rifles were used majorly by some nations, wigs were abandoned by most armies, people now ussaully fought wearing packs, theres a lot more but thatas jsut a small start.

I believe that Napoleon was the turning point from old tactics to the tactics we use today. He made warfare more about campaigning, marching and pre and post battle moves rather than the battles themselves. He made artillery the ultimate weapon, and moved his army faster than anyone ever before. Using dirty tricks, decieving the enemy, making them fall into his plans, and changing his plans around what the enemy does. Cutting them off from there supply lines, and all sorts of manuvers never seen before.

The Napoleonic Wars was probably one of the biggest tactical turning points since Agincourt, The next turning point would probably be between WWI and WWII.

Originally Posted by ♔Marshal Beale♔

The Napoleonic Wars was probably one of the biggest tactical turning points since Agincourt, The next turning point would probably be between WWI and WWII.

I think the ACW was probably a big turning point - then people began to see than line formations + rifles weren't a good combination.

Originally Posted by T.C.

I think the ACW was probably a big turning point - then people began to see than line formations + rifles weren't a good combination.

Probably a bit late but absolutely correct. The ACW began looking back (if you will) to Napoleonic era tactics and - after the battle of Gettysburg - increasingly forward to WWI.

Lee's men became masters of recognising and occupying defensive posiitions (and making them stronger) - the siegeworks defending Richmond and Petersburg were at least as elaborate (lacking concrete) as any made by the Germans on the Western Front. Burnside in fact could almost be called the 'Jules Verne' of warfare as he was the first recorded using wire entanglements (telegraph wire not barbed wire) to defend a position and was also the instigator of the famous 'Mine' that blew a hole in the confederate position - which was wasted but that wasn't his fault.

The big strategical difference was the use of railroads, which is often ignored, then - when you can move troops and supplies at 30 miles ph by rail but once off the trains can move only at the speed of a horse or marching man - the possibility of making and exploiting a breakthrough becomes exceedingly difficult as the enemy can move up reserves faster than you can move through the devastated battle-area...

Lucius

Napoleon introduced the corps system, which allows his army to move faster in seperate parts, and can join together when engaged with the enemy. The army unit 'division' was also invented during the revolutionary wars by Lazare Carnot. Conscription and the massive manufacturing of weapons ensure the huge size of battles never seen before in Europe, and Napoleon's aggressive tactics of column attacks, mass cavalry charge, and concentration of artillery fire result in huge casualities on both sides.
Frederick the Great, in other hand, depend on his excellent quality of soldiers and cunning attacking moves such as the oblique attack at Leuthen. He always command the whole army on his own, but his army's size only equals to one corps in Napoleon's Grand Armee, when every Napoleon's battles often involves several corps. Therefore Napoleon must rely on the merit of his subordinates to execute his preliminary moves and cunning blows, such as Soult's centre attack at Austerlitz, Davout's brilliant defense at Auerstadt, Murat's charge at Eylau, and Grouchy's pursuit of Blucher at Waterloo. Which have different results from the 'Mission Impossible' victory at Auerstadt to Ney's disastrous attack at Waterloo.
My conclusion is, in the previous century battles were often conduct as one general vs. another, while in the Napoleonic Wars brilliant plans sometimes fail if your subordinates loose control.

Strategic - corps system, battalion carre formation, superior mobility from living off the land, objective becomes not the capture of territory but destruction of main enemy army

Tactical - primarily perfected co-ordination of artillery, cavalry and infantry in creating and breaking through enemy weak points.

There are literally thousands of books on this - try reading one....

There was also the whole concept of the 'levee en-masse', conscription and the nation in arms, which boosted the number of troops that could be fielded and reduced the value of a soldiers life to the point where they could now be squandered with impunity.

It was essentially the end of the idea of small professional and expensive armies.

Originally Posted by Didz

There was also the whole concept of the 'levee en-masse', conscription and the nation in arms, which boosted the number of troops that could be fielded and reduced the value of a soldiers life to the point where they could now be squandered with impunity.

It was essentially the end of the idea of small professional and expensive armies.

apart from in England

Originally Posted by AUSSIE11

apart from in England

True, Britain never introduced conscription durng the Napoleonic Wars. It introduced a conscription ballot for its home defence forces which deemed all men aged 15 to 40 (with certain exceptions) eligible for service in the militia. But these regiments were guarantee'd not to be posted abroad. The British Army itself remained a volunteer army throughout the war, though it was bolstered heavily by foriegn troops paid for by the British tax-payer.

It was French who first raised the 'levee en-mass' and introduced the concept of a nation in arms, providing them initially with huge boost in man-power and the option to squander the lives of its soldiers as and when necessary. Other nations followed suit, such as Prussia which declared its own 'levee en-mass' in 1813 which added over 120,000 men to its army.

As for the American Civil War, it really contributed little to the evolution of warfare itself. Weapon technology certainly developed over the period with the more general introduction of rifled and breechloading weapons, and the role of cavalry or the battlefield diminished but essentially the Franco-Prussian War continued to use the same tactic's after this experience and the same general approaches to warfare remained until after the Crimean War and even into the Boar War. It was perhaps the Boar War that finally persuaded military thinkers that it was best to try and make your soldiers harder to see and hit and not to stand them in lines in the open.

What The American Civil War did introduce was the first concepts of total warfare, e.g. the idea that non-military resources and people were legitimate targets and that destroying a nations ability to wage war was just as important as killing its soldiers.

Originally Posted by Didz

It was perhaps the Boar War that finally persuaded military thinkers that it was best to try and make your soldiers harder to see and hit and not to stand them in lines in the open.

i can't remember the exact date but i think it was just before the boer war that the brits adopted Khaki uniforms. surely that was when the brits at least vaguely got the idea. but maybe the first case of uniform "Camoflage" was the british green jackets of the 95th and 60th.

Originally Posted by AUSSIE11

i can't remember the exact date but i think it was just before the boer war that the brits adopted Khaki uniforms. surely that was when the brits at least vaguely got the idea. but maybe the first case of uniform "Camoflage" was the british green jackets of the 95th and 60th.

The British Army went into the Boer war wearing bright scarlet shell jackets and white helmets, it was during the Boer War that the idea finally sank in that it wasn't a good idea and the khaki uniforms and helmet covers were issued.

Incidently, the green jackets issued to the 60th and 95th were nothing to do with camoflage. In fact, in 1800 tests were conducted by Woolwich Arsenal that clearly indicated that the best colour uniform for skirmishers was actually grey. The tests proved that targets painted grey were much harder to hit than those painted red, blue, white or green. However, the government ignored the advice and stuck with green simply because it was the traditional colour for British light infantry (being used for the feather of light companies) and because of the pressure against a change from manufacturers of uniform cloth who had investments in the production of green material.

The French of course opted for grey uniforms in WW1 and I've seen analysis that confirms the earlier Woolwich tests showing that they were much harder to hit than the British troops even when wearing khaki.

You can learn quite a bit by visiting your technology panal often and read their descriptions.

The size of the armies is probably the principal one. Also he introduced a new tactic of destroying an army's Center and then enveloping the left and right-flanks by dividing in two. That's how Austerlitz was won. He also tried to force the enemy into Squares by charging them with cavalry, thereby reducing their rate of fire by 75%. He tried both at Waterloo but failed, because the enemy were now wise to his tactics, and because of treachery e.g. Marshal August Marmont marching his troops to surrender to the British.

Originally Posted by Geronimo2006

The size of the armies is probably the principal one.

We have a winner.

Corps forming, columns and artillery tactics have all prior been propagated not just by military thinkers, but also by generals, most notable Marshall Saxe. Also Cornwallis (who wasn't a bad general) wrote some discourses on movement in columns.

The sheer size of the army made it possible to do some very interesting strategic tricks, like creating several sub-armies in the approach (Prussia 1806), it also made possible tactical tricks as Austerlitz, because the battlefield became enormous.

if there is an often overlooked personal quality of Napoleon, it's his love of war (he was called "the god of war" by von Clausewitz). There were more large encounters in a few years than in the whole century before.

So the change is: Much larger armies combined with a much higher intensity. This has led to huge loss of lives. Napoleon had a very bad name in the 19th century among historians for a reason(even among french), he was seen as a butcher. Perhaps it took a first world war to desensitize us a bit to start admiring him as a public, or perhaps it was the bigger gap in time.

I think the ACW was probably a big turning point - then people began to see than line formations + rifles weren't a good combination.

Dont think so, in my opionion it was more a major "evolution point", which showed up where the warfare will end with the increase of firepower. Which finally led to the domination of the Machine-Gun on the World-War one Battlefields.
I think the tactic itself didnt changed that much during this time... of course the soldiers didnt walked anymore 100 feet in front of the other regiment and fired, but the formations still were rather dense, and the different regiments tried to act as closly thogether as possible.
If you want, you can also see the trenches of the First World war as one major "line formation".

The first revolution was the usage of tanks, which breaked the dominat role of the Maschinegun. So the mobility of units gained again the upperhand over the firepower. And the ulimative revolution was the german Panzer-tactic during the first years of Second World war.

The deep penetrations of small tank units without secure flanks, was such a different kind of warfare that the french had no answer for it.. most major powers, even the germans thought that a new confrontation between Germany and France would result into the same situation as 1914-1918.
So the introduction of tanks was a real revolution which led to the modern "High mobility" Warfare.

Sry for a bit OT^^.

Originally Posted by Primergy

Dont think so, in my opionion it was more a major "evolution point", which showed up where the warfare will end with the increase of firepower. Which finally led to the domination of the Machine-Gun on the World-War one Battlefields.
I think the tactic itself didnt changed that much during this time... of course the soldiers didnt walked anymore 100 feet in front of the other regiment and fired, but the formations still were rather dense, and the different regiments tried to act as closly thogether as possible.
If you want, you can also see the trenches of the First World war as one major "line formation".

The first revolution was the usage of tanks, which breaked the dominat role of the Maschinegun. So the mobility of units gained again the upperhand over the firepower. And the ulimative revolution was the german Panzer-tactic during the first years of Second World war.

The deep penetrations of small tank units without secure flanks, was such a different kind of warfare that the french had no answer for it.. most major powers, even the germans thought that a new confrontation between Germany and France would result into the same situation as 1914-1918.
So the introduction of tanks was a real revolution which led to the modern "High mobility" Warfare.

Sry for a bit OT^^.

I disagree. You are forgetting the widespread use of telegraph, railroad,ironclads,rifling,repeating weapons. That war led to dramtic change in strategy and tactics. The next big change would be WWI with the refinement of those as well as the introduction of truly modern warfare.

I think that afair statement is that each long lasting period of war led to dramatic modifications of warfare as new technology was introduced.

The Boar War sounds much more fun than the Boer War.....

And on camouflage look at the modern US ACU which combines green, tan and grey.

Also consider that most of the action the 95th saw was in Spain where green would have stuck out almost as much as red.

Another important difference: logistics and supply. Napoleon's corps system and his maneuvering system of warfare was possible because of a massive revolution in organizing, equipping and feeding the French army. Armies in the 1700s had long, heavy baggage trains that made them road-bound, and they depended on systems of army depots to keep them supplied on campaign. That put a premium on capturing cities and their resources, and that meant siege warfare was often more important to 1700s generals than destroying the enemy army. The pre-Napoleonic era was the era of elaborate engineered fortresses and citadels. Also, the armies of the 1700s were smaller and (in Europe) professional. They were the playthings of kings, and often didn't know (or care) that passionately about what they were fighting for. So campaigns and battles tended to happen in a more "gentlemanly" way, where troops generally didn't fight in the winter, surrendered rather than fight to the end, and often allowed defeated enemy armies to escape without pursuing and hunting down every last enemy soldier.