Power politics requires the existence of power and is influenced by how much power a state has and what forms this power takes. The book looks at the sources of Russian power in Alexander’s reign. That of course means the imperial army, and in particular its structure of command, tactics, ‘doctrine’ and personnel. But it also means Russian military industry, public finance, horse industry and manpower. Russian strengths and weaknesses in these areas help to explain how the empire fought the war and why it triumphed. As is always the case, the political regime and the social context heavily influenced both the mobilization and the use of the empire’s resources. The basis of the Russian political and social order was serfdom. The imperial army was a professional force whose soldiers were a separate estate of the realm and who served for twenty-five years of their lives. How could and did such a society and army meet and overcome Napoleon’s challenge? The Russian officer corps, and in particular its senior ranks, were very much a part of the overall imperial elite, itself still largely aristocratic. Army, aristocracy and government were a maze of family and patronage networks. It is often impossible to understand how the army functioned unless we take this into account.
The same is true as regards the values and culture of the imperial army’s generals and officers. Honour, publicly displayed courage, and loyalty to regiment and fellow-officers all mattered greatly. So too did living up to one’s status and rank. The battlefield, like the duel, allowed honour to be publicly displayed and defended. In some respects the ‘field of honour’ – in other words the battlefield – was also the ancestor of today’s sporting match. ‘Winning’ meant holding one’s ground and capturing trophies such as cannon and standards. These male warrior values appear not just archaic but also sometimes childish: nevertheless they mattered greatly because they affected morale and kept officers steadfast in the face of death and mutilation. A key problem in the 1812 campaign was that these values cut right across Russia’s strategic imperative to retreat.21
Though the historian can write with some confidence of officers’ values and motivation, understanding the mentalities of the rank and file is far more difficult. In 1812–14 more than 1.5 million men served as privates or NCOs in the army and militia. Only two left memoirs.22 These can be eked out by a few oral reminiscences recorded decades later and by the personnel records of many regiments preserved in the archives. Often, however, one is forced to interpret soldiers’ values through their actions and through what their officers said about them. This has obvious dangers. But a book which simply took as a given the courage, endurance and loyalty of Russian soldiers in the face of awful privations and – sometimes – brutal treatment by their superiors would be ignoring one of the most vital but also at times puzzling elements in the wars.
Russia is the biggest gap in contemporary Western understanding of the Napoleonic era. The aim of this book is to fill that gap. But a more knowledgeable and realistic understanding of Russian power and policy can also change overall perspectives on the Napoleonic era. In this period Russia was less powerful than Britain. Its global reach was much weaker. Unlike Austria or Prussia, however, Russian interests and perspectives were not just narrowly continental. For a significant section of the ruling elite the Napoleonic Wars were in one sense a distraction and a sideshow. They saw Russia’s main interests as lying in expansion southwards against the Ottomans and Persians. These men seldom saw France itself as Russia’s main or inevitable enemy. Most of them believed that the Napoleonic empire was a transient phenomenon, born of exceptional circumstances and Napoleon’s genius. The most impressive member of this group was Count Nikolai Rumiantsev, who was in practice Russia’s minister of foreign affairs from late in 1807 until Napoleon invaded Russia. In his view the greatest long-term challenge to Russia lay in Britain’s growing domination of global finance, trade and industry, and in her monopoly of naval power. This view of Russian interests was ultimately overruled by Alexander I. Above all, it was undermined by Napoleon, who forced the Russian government to make fighting France its top priority. But Rumiantsev’s perspective had some impact on Russian policy in 1812 because it was shared in part by Mikhail Kutuzov. It also provides an interesting insight into some of the underlying realities of the Napoleonic era.
