Guidance to Freedom or Just Another Tyrant?

Guidance to Freedom or Just Another Tyrant?

When most people think of Napoleon Bonaparte they think of either a tyrant emperor or a brilliant war strategist. Maybe both are right but in whatever conclusion any person comes to, they will know he was a small man who accomplished many great things. Napoleon conquered countries and developed a mass empire, which led to his celebrity like fame. He was a man that respected cultures and every religion and even cried when his men died on the battlefield. Bonaparte was an amazing person who drove himself with great ambition to become one of the greatest leaders ever in history.

In life every great leader has had their own story to tell. Napoleon was born a Corsican, at Ajaccio, in 1769. He had seven brothers and sisters and he was also a descendent from the Florentine nobility. He moved to France and started school at the age of nine. At school he was picked on because of his Italian accent and because of his influent French. When he turned sixteen he joined the French artillery and became a lieutenant in a short period of time. Napoleon spent the next seven years reading the works of philosophers and educating himself in military matters, by studying the campaigns of great military leaders of the past. He then became a general and then in 1795 was appointed to stop an uprising in Paris and seceded in doing so. After stopping the uprising he was then given the position of commander in chief of the interior French army in Italy. In 1799 he was elected as the First Consul of France because the people were sick of the directory. He rose up in power in the military and also politically. He then formed his own empire and won many battles with his brilliance.

Bonaparte was an intelligent man with an extrodinary memory, while staying very open minded toward other people's beliefs. As Vox states "When he had an hour for diversion, he not infrequently employed it in looking over a book of logarithms [Ð'...]. So retentive was his memory of numbers, that sums over which he had once glanced his eye were in his mind ever after (69)." If I lived in his empire I would at least respect Napoleon for his brilliance, his ability to memorize information, and his will to learn more. Although, Napoleon still had his flaws. He was still only human and I think his main flaw is his big ego. Yet without his ego he would have not been able to declare himself an emperor. Victor Blair says "Even his harshest critics have conceded that his egoism was the driving force towards greatness, and that his self-conceit was at least earned by genius and determination."

With his studying he learned that in order to govern France he must first win over the people. He knew that not only did he have to win the people's popularity, but that he also needed support form his soldiers. He promised all of his soldiers that they would eat, be clothed well, and paid for their services. Even after the French Revolution he still thought the French people only cared about how France was portrayed. "I do not believe the French love liberty and equality. They are not changed by ten years of revolution. They are like the Gauls, proud and fickle: they have only one sentiment, honor (Markham 63)." This shows he wanted the approval of the people to be emperor and not to be a slave of how the people thought. He began to win over the people in the late eighteenth century and decided that he wanted to be the next Alexander the Great.

As Bonaparte took power, some looked at him as a tyrant or even a new king maybe. He ran the government and made the decisions and laws for France. He hated and loved the people because they looked at him as a king but still they reinforced his position. Some people of the time thought that maybe the French Revolution was a waste if they are just going to have another ruler that makes the laws like a king. This annoyed Napoleon greatly because he was just another soldier of the revolution and that he was not a king just another person with flaws; His flaws being the inability to endure wrong and to lead the French with success.

Napoleon was incredibly fond of schooling so he created his own military geniuses. "As one would expect, the primary function of the educational institutions was to produce military men. [Ð'...] Because Napoleon stressed the militaristic side of education, the best pupils of the lycÐ"©es were sent at government expense to a special military school (Holtman "Propaganda" 132)." I think that Bonaparte was either looking for future leaders of his army or another boy like he was to be the next emperor.

Most if not all religions were accepted by Napoleon and this was shown when he accepted the pope to France and made Catholicism the official religion of France. Even though the official religion was Catholicism, all other religions were accepted and Bonaparte did not discriminate against people for their religion. When he took over Egypt he did not deny them anything because of their religion but actually only helped them to show that he did care:

Napoleon was determined to modernize Egyptian society while making every effort to respect its culture particularly religion. One of the first reforms he enacted was the establishment of a printing press, which he used to make posters in Arabic proclaiming the good intentions of the French who had come as liberators and who respected the Muslim faith. Napoleon even considered converting to Islam to demonstrate his good will. A tax-collecting bureaucracy was created and within weeks a sizeable revenue had been amassed. A mint was established to coin money. Napoleon used the generated revenue to install gas lamps for the streets of Cairo and build a sewage system. In addition he founded Egypt's first Postal Service and Health Department. (Miller)

When I think of an emperor I would not imagine one that would conquer countries and then start helping them with the tax money that is collected from those countries. Napoleon was truly a unique man for being such a conquering emperor.

Napoleon was only able to achieve his positions in France by winning the trust of the people in France and the trust of his soldiers. Bonaparte knew one thing for sure about his soldiers and winning. He knew that if he was to win battles that the morale and the willingness of his soldiers must be high so that he would be able to win and move on. In order to keep the morale of his army high he started propaganda and spread it throughout his army. With the moral of his soldiers high he could start his own battle tactics and win fights for over 10 years.

Squared battalion was a tactic that Bonaparte used which used an approach of three roads and with his cavalry