War And Peace

As if to flex their muscles and prepare for the great movement ahead of them, the forces of the west lunge eastward on several occasions – in 1805, 1806, 1807 and 1809 – building up strength and adding to their numbers. In 1811 a group of men formed in France joins forces with an enormous group from the peoples of Central Europe. The growth in numbers is matched by an increase in the force of justification on the part of the man at the head of the movement. Throughout the ten-year preparatory period preceding the great movement this man has been hobnobbing with all the crowned heads of Europe. The discredited rulers of the world have no sensible concept or rational ideal with which to challenge the mindless Napoleonic ideal of glory and greatness. They fall over each other to demonstrate their lack of substance. The King of Prussia sends his wife to suck up to the great man; the Emperor of Austria considers it a mark of esteem that this man should take a daughter of the Kaisers to his bed. The Pope, the guardian of all that the nations hold sacred, uses religion to enhance the great man’s reputation. It is not a question of Napoleon preparing himself for his new part; everything around him encourages him to assume personal responsibility for what is being done and is about to be done. There is no action, no atrocity, no little bit of trickery he could indulge in without it being immediately represented on the lips of those about him as a great deed. The best tribute the Germans can dream up for him is the celebration of Jena and Auerstadt. Here, not only is he a great man, but greatness devolves also to his ancestors, brothers, stepsons and brothers-in-law. Everything conspires to deprive him of the last scintilla of reason, and prepare him for his terrible role. Once he is ready, so are his forces.

The invading army flows east and reaches its ultimate goal: Moscow. The capital is taken; the Russian army suffers heavier losses than any opposing army in previous wars from Austerlitz to Wagram. But all of a sudden, instead of the chance contingencies and genius that had ensured such a consistent, uninterrupted run of successes leading him towards his destined goal he is faced with a vast number of chance contingencies working in reverse, from the cold he caught at Borodino to the spark that set Moscow on fire, and instead of genius we see in him unparalleled stupidity and wickedness.

The invading army runs away, turns back and runs away again; by now all the chance contingencies are going against him rather than for him.

Then comes the reverse movement from east to west, astonishingly similar to the west-to-east movement that has preceded it. As in 1805, 1807 and 1809 the same tentative westward lunges precede the great eastward movement. There is the same combination into a single group of vast proportions, the same process by which the peoples of Central Europe join in with the general movement, the same half-way hesitation and the same acceleration as the goal gets nearer.

Paris, the ultimate goal, is reached. Napoleon’s government and armies are in tatters. Napoleon himself is of no further consequence; all his actions are obviously mean and pathetic, but once again inexplicable chance intervenes. The allies detest Napoleon, seeing him as the cause of all their troubles. Stripped of all power and authority, exposed as a crook and a villain, he ought to have been recognized as he had been ten years earlier, and would be a year later, as a bandit and an outlaw. But by some curious contingency no one sees this. His part has not been fully played out. The man who ten years before, and one year later, was looked on as a bandit and an outlaw is now dispatched to an island two days’ journey from France presented to him as his dominion, with guards and millions to spend, as if he had done something worth paying for.

CHAPTER 4

The oceanic surge of the peoples begins to settle down within its shores. Its huge waves have flooded back, leaving little eddies on a calm surface – diplomats who fondly imagine that they have been the calming influence.

Then suddenly the calm sea surges up again. The diplomats imagine that they and their bones of contention are the cause of this new upheaval, and they anticipate warfare between their sovereigns. The situation seems impossible. But although they can sense the gathering wave, it doesn’t come from where they expect it. It is the same wave with the same starting point – in Paris – the last backwash of the movement from the west, a wave that will soon resolve the diplomatic difficulties that seem so intractable and put an end to the military unrest of the period.