Why did Napoleon go to war with Russia?

Answer 1

The biggest one, and the one that ultimately undid his whole campaign, was ironically the same mistake that Hitler made: namely, going to war in Russia in the middle of winter. Napoleon never recuperated from the dramatic losses of that winter.

Conrad Jalowski's response:

Napoleon Bonaparte made multitudinous mistakes during the Triumvirate: 1799-1804 CE and Despotate: 1804-1815 CE. Despite cognoscible and brilliant military campaigns such as of the Italian katabasis in the promontory from 1796-1797 CE of Montenotte, Millesimo, Saint Michele, Ceva, Lodi, Bassano, Rovento and Mondavi, and the socio-political changes with the castrametation of Cisalpine Caul, and the Transpadane and Cispadane Synhedrions as 'titular' autarchies, and the hoplomachies of Marengo, Austerlitz, Jena-Austerdt, Friedland and Wagram, he suffered setbacks at Eylau, Borodino, Leipzig and Waterloo. The first major error was not creating a symmachia or military alliance with Austria in a Paris-Vienna axis that would have balanced the power in Europe and kept Russia at bay whilst allowing Napoleon I: 1769-1831 CE time to consolidate and solidify his peripherals and palatinates within Italy, the Helvetian Republic, the Autarchy of Naples, the Piedmont Kingdom and the Dutch-Belgian demarcation. He would have had less to govern thus diminishing military expenditure, over-extension of manpower, and resultant economic exhaustion. Another error was the two-front war, both in the Iberian promontory and Russia in 1807-1814 CE. Instead of appointing a hegemon of Iberia, Napoleon I promoted four marshals with four separate peripherals thus rendering them autonomous warlords inimical and contumacious to the Commander-inChief of Iberia thus abjurating any unitary command and letting dilapidation set in as the Imperial command was divided. Another failure was not tocreate a secure line of defense and garrison the mercantile and maritime supporting cities with the adscititious and creating a final reserve at a secure "central location" from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic such as a Catalonia-Galicia axis. (By being divided, Spanish irregulars were able to utilize scorched earth policy and Fabian attrition.) In terms of economical warfare, the Berlin Blockade (later to be expanded into the ContinentalBlockade)which could hardly have restricted the flow of British commodities as it had a gargantuan system of peripherals and hegemonies around the world, thus causing greater harm to France itself and exciting dissidence and unrest for the current regime. In the east, the failure in the famed Russian anabasis was ditrichotomous: the failure for a tripartite incursion with the Swedish throne being ascended by Napoleon I's mortal enemy Bernadotte, and the Ottoman Empire's symmachia with Russia, thus allowing Russia to concentrate all its military contingents at the center where Napoleon Bonaparte was expected to traverse. (Concentrating forces at the decisive point was promulgated by the Prussian military theorist Karl von Klausewitz). A second failure in the Russian campaign was the overwhelming size of the phalanxes which were a negative factor- the logistics for supporting 675,000 soldiers was gargantuan and posed a considerable problem to the overall campaign, which resulted in Napoleon Bonaparte's inability to subjugate Russia. In the end, the greatest inimical was his hubris which eventually consumed him...

Now I'm wondering what an expert on ancient history would be doing answering a question about Napoleon.

EmperorGeneral -- OK Here is how it went like this napoleon was a french war here then a French General, the in the French Revolution he sided with the revolutionaries, eventualy he became into power then he was elected like 44,000,000 to 8,000 votes a epic victory as the first council of France. then he became more like a love dictator (see what many people do not understand is that napoleon was at first good for France) well anyway after that he was crowned emperor and his wife emperess. well he invaded a great many countries of Europe austria, russia, prussia, and many more, finnaly they all got pissed and went against him. he finnaly signed a treaty and eventually an alliance with the Tsar of russia Alexander (Aleksandar) the first of russia, well napoleon was happy because someone of true nobility had accepted him even though he was clearly not of blood nobility as he was elected. finaly his ambitions got ahead of him and he made his friends and family kings and princes of the countries he had conquered, well he decided to divorce the empress Josaphine (think that's how you spell it) and marry the Tsar of russias sister, well when he asked the Tsar for his sisters hand in marrage Alexander said No. this and other insults quickly lit the flame for the new war with russia in the meanwhile he asked for the emperor of austrias daughters hand in marrage the emperor of austria said yes immediatly as he wanted peace and an end to napoleons campaingn against austria as napoleon was going to otherwise burn it to the ground, now after all this he double crossed and screwed over a lot of people, not too bad tho only the only people you don't really want to screw over but anyway he went against austria and since this was the second time he bouble crossed someone little did he know that eventually and inevitably it would all double back on him, anyway he led an army of 650,000 into russia and went to the capital to find it empty aflame and burning not to mention despite the flames cold. now Alexander had a stradegy for abandoning his capital, see it was burned down all but one building, and winter was approaching and 650,000 people no building and theyre not native to the barren cold inhospitible landscape of russia napoleon had to retreat losing almost all of his men that's when the colition striked all the nations of Europe invaded napoleon was captured and sent into exile on the island of elba well his ambitions could not be contained for long and so napoleon planned his escape, well he did escape and came back overthrew the king and once more was the emperor for about 115 days during this time he knew strike from the swift blede of the forces was coming all down upon France like a hellshower of men if he didnt strike first, so he held to his most valuable allie himself and his ambition fuled mind and he stuck to the strategy that had always payed off for him DIVIDE AND CONQUER - an old military maxim, he thought if he cold raise an army and defeat all the nations of Europe one by one he could save France and save his own life, he was utterly wrong and with one act of utter stupidity and ignorance of reality deserves one utter loss but one even stroke of luck he manage to escape France but was forces to surrender to a British man-of-war class battleship guarding the harbor while he was on his way to America, he was once more exiled to an island but this time he wouldn't be so lucky. he spent the remainder of his life in and island in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Africa where he died in 1821.

my god does no one know why he invaded all i keep seeing is stupid explainations, the real reason is because his ally russia didnt want to stop trading with Britain, this pissed off napoleon who could only defeat Britain by starving it. he tried to reconvince his ally to agree with the blokeade, the tsar said no so napoleon invaded to convince him otherwise

Answer 2

Napoleon's power was based off of conquest. He hadn't ever lost a war yet; so he kept conquering more and more; he figured that he was unbeatable. He had to keep conquering bigger and bigger things or else he would lose his reputation; so he wanted to conquer Russia.

His main goal in attacking Russia was to force them to rejoin the continental system.

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Answer 3

Napoleon wanted Russia to cut off trade with Britain (and some other counries). If Napoleon could act together with the Tsar, the two could control Europe together.

Answer 4

Napoleon invaded Russia in order to further complete his mastery of Europe. As he had virtually defeated all other nation states in Europe

Answer 5

So he could commit suicide and not have to go though another war, although he failed that attempt, he was then later killed by a disease on an abandoned island.

Answer 6

He didn't. The Russian winter defeated him.

Answer 7

Russia was not complying with the Continental System.