Bonaparte's Horsemen (Alain Lausard Adventure) [Hardcover]

Fans of military fiction will find Bonaparte's Horsemen an involving account of 1807 Poland, where Napoleon is facing a dangerous battle and Sergeant Lausard his most decisive battle. Add historical insights to a fast-paced plot of military fiction and you have a story which just doesn't quit.

This book tells the story of how Bonaparte finally took his continental dominion to its highest point of power. In that sense, this was the pinnacle of French power in Europe and probably the height of their influence in the world in general.

Of course, the context of the telling of the story is a focus on the adventures of Alain Lausard. However, I do want at the outset to explain that I think this book needs to be read for historical context as well as entertainment.

While it is most common for historians to comment on this period as a costly period where Napoleon did not win as magically as before, it is essential to recognize that, after the Treaty of Tilsit in the Neiman, Napoleon and the French had defeated all the armies of Europe in detail and were therefore able to force everyone, including the inscrutable Mother Russia, to contradict their essential vital interests by a boycott of English trade.

While the incremental costs were rising to Napoleon and his incremental benefits were declining, at Tilsit the powers of the French Empire were maximized and would never again be so high, or its reverberations in history so complete.

In ultimate truth, the greatest strategic error of Napoleon Bonaparte was not military. It was economic. Had Bonaparte used the Treaty of Tilsit to create a way to profit from British trade with Europe, rather than institute a boycott that could never work, he would have ruled as Emperor of Europe for all his days and France would have become the center of a fully integrated Europe by the mid to late 19th century. Boycotts do not create power. There has been no power in the world or in the history of civilization greater than gains to trade. If Bonaparte had garnered a small and reasonable fraction of the overall gains to trade of the day he would have harnessed the loyalty of all Europe. All he had to do was promote the trade and not threaten the lives or lifestyle of the inept and ruling Bourbons. Trade would have secured his power. Food and wine and art would have secured the Bourbons. England alone could have never defeated the French. Napoleon gave the Germans, Russians and Austrians incentive to fight him as a coalition because he wanted to impose a system on them no less economically harmful than the way the Germans were punished again in the 20th century by the ill-fated Treaty of Versailles.

This book is not convincing evidence of the diplomatic and economic background of the story, nor is it intended to be. However, this creates a compelling reason to read the book and get interested in the accomplishments and travails of the interlude. The book tells of the struggle and the cost in the most human and personal terms. In that sense, I rate this book a 5 because it makes the reading of the broader history far more rich than it would otherwise be.

History must put it all together in a lesson for the future. With that, I will now provide a brief summary of the scope of the book and note any important differences in the plot or character development than differentiates this book from the previous five volumes. You should read the books in sequence and in the broader context with some other historical aids. I give it two thumbs up on all fronts and I hope Mr. Howard will be able somehow to complete his stories. I would like to see Lausard as Marechal of France in fiction. I think such Gingrich-esque speculative history is very acceptable, even to Napoleonic purists.

More to follow...