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The Peninsular Was and Its Effects

发布时间:2017-04-14
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PENINSULAR WAR AND ITS EFFECTS

A brief history of the Peninsular War (1807-1814)

By the year 1808, Napoleon conquered most of the Europe and sustained a French dominance. as Napoleon defeated Austria, Prussia and Russia it erased military enemies in Europe. Peninsula Wars, which is also known as Guerra de la Indepencia in Spanish, was part of the Napoleon Wars that fought in the Iberian Peninsula. French forces were countered by the troops of Spanish, British and Portuguese. This peninsutla battle is considered as one of the notable turning points for defeating Napoleon and eventually downfall. The origin of the war was founded in reluctance of Portugese regarding with the Napoleon’s Continental System.

In order to block Portuguese trade with British, Napoleon would like Portuguese to close its borders to England and declare a war. “In the autumn of 1807 first steps of war were taken when French troops started to march to invade Portugal through Spain. French forces under the command of Jean-Andoche Junot, was able to capture Lisbon- the capital of Portuguese- failed to catch the royal family who flee to Brasil.” (Arnold, 2009) After the French forces entered Spain, Napoleon usurped the Spanish throne for the sake of his own brother and that is how Napoleon created a new enemy who will undermine his success in the future and mainly consist of peasantry and church. When opposition and uprising emerged, Napoleon was surprised, as he didn’t expect negative reaction. He was also so blinded to foresee the impossibility of suppressing revolt.

Thanks to Napoleon, Britain achieved a new ally as of 1808. Moreover, informal groups who are reluctant to conscription to army, stated to form irregular forces, which will constitute the guerilla part of the war. “The dwellings of Iberian Peninsula were conservative, religious, proud and extremely against foreign forces. Together with this attributes, fear triggered massive, spontaneous, leaderless uprisings in the peninsula.” (Dendle, 1991) These oppositions constituted a base for six year war between nations.

The overall consequences of the aforementioned war

Napoleon described the peninsular wars as “bleeding ulcer” which was absorbing men, money and morale of the empire ,as you cannot stint when you have a serious problem like ulcer. Hundereds of thousands of French soldiers were confined to Iberian peninsula for almost six years. “The numbers of armed forces of French forces were varying between 100,000 to 370,000. The number of casualties of war fluctuates relatively, however it is stated “a quarter of a million” men in the book The Peninsular War of Charles Esdaile.” (2002).

For Spanish and Portuguese, the Guerra de la Indepencia (Independence War) generated initially disastrous results that significantly outline their fate. “According to reckonings the number of casualties on the Spanish side approaches over one million that constitutes more that 10 percent of the population at that time. On the Portuguese side the statitistics indicated five to ten percent loses from the population.” (Esdaile, 2002) Not to mention to destruction of the region by the occupation forces of France as well as by the informal bands. Consequently, industrial production and internal commerce in both countries suffered with respect to economic dimension of the war and invasion. Aftermath of the six years of struggle, Spain and Portuguese lost most of their colonies in America which is deemed to be most significant economic devastation. Another negative result of the war for both Spanish and Portuguese was the increase in divergence of the society between those who advocates constitutionalism, bourgeoisie and secularism and those who supports monarchy, aristocracy and clergy. These political and social outcomes will be examined deeply in the following sections.

Social and political effects of the war on Spain

Peninsular War was actually a large-scale total war, which affected a bunch of countries such as British, Spain, Portugal, France in several different ways. It is emphasized by Johnson that “it was between 1807-1814 lasted until the Sixth Coalition put an end to the war in 1814.” (2010)

In the following paragraphs, the social and political effects of Peninsular War will be depicted as several new reforms and regulations were made by the time the war ended. To start with, one of the greatest impact of the war was the Spanish War of Independence during 1808-1814 overlapping the Peninsular War. To intersect the two irremediable events, Dos de Mayo rebellion can be given as an example. Madrid citizens revolted against French as the city was occupied by French troops resulting in triggering the war of Peninsular.

After the destruction of Spanish administration leading to the fall of monarchy, constitutional power was fragmented into provincial or local juntas, as the junta being the name chosen for local administrations. As a result, the first national assembly was gathered to sovereign in Spain. However, since the very number of small juntas, it was quite impossible to enhance a single legislative body for the whole empire. Realizing that a unity should be yet to come, associating the dispersed local forces and efforts, Supreme Juntas such as Seville, Valencia, Castille and Leon called for formation of the juntas. Finally, Extraordinary and General Cortes of the Spanish Nation was gathered to fill the absence of the king and royal government.

As stated by Charles Oman “after the Peninsular War King Ferdinand VIII revoked all the changes that regulated by the Cortes, leading to enhanced and strengthened monarchy as before. Among the society everyone specified and determined as liberals were prosecuted and as expected liberal movements were cut unfinished.” (1902) For instance, the first Spanish Constitution that was accepted by the liberal Cortes was denied and was put an end by King Ferdinand VIII.

On the other hand, the conflict of Napoleon’s occupation of Spain should also be taken into account as a social effect of the ongoing war. Since the nationalists fought in revolting to gain independence, the nationalism was triggered and enhanced.

The French side should expected small local risings in revolt, but the unforeseen event was the greatest impact of guerrilla warfare, which supports the social side of the war. This violent opposition in the form of s spontaneous and massive insurrection against French troops vividly coalesced into a now popular movement, which by the time the French could not be able to suppress over a period of broadly six years. In Peninsular War, two different forms of warfare was seen; as the first one was regular armies utilizing traditional tactics and strategies while Spanish forces fighting in conjuction including tactics of ambushes, sabotages, hit-and-runs. The relentless hound of the French weakened the French armies unexpectedly and make Napoleon to call the conflict as “Spanish Ulcer” respectively, which became a popular social saying to define and identify the Spanish guerrilla warfare.

Social and political effects of the war on Portugal

Until now the political and social effect of Peninsular War on Spanish Side was depicted and explained. However, the war effected the Portugal side as vastly as Spanish side too. Politically, the French invasion of Portugal was the first campaign of the Peninsular War. “Since Portugal refused to blockade the British trade as known as Continental System which happens to be the foreign policy of Napoleon I during his conflict era with Great Britain, French had a reason to enter Portugal beside the fact that it was an opportunity for Napoleon to make his way into Spain unnoticed.” (Oman, 1902) At that time Portugal was ruled by Prince.

John whose main concern and aim was to keep Portugal neutral among the international relations. However, Napoleon and Charles IV of Spain demanded John declare war on Britain and put regulations and enforcements on British living in Portugal and keep their side.

After some diplomatic relations which influenced the ongoing process between Portugal and France and Portuguese alliance with the United Kingdom, General Andoche Junot, who happens to be a temperamental French general, entered Lisbon and occupied the capital of Portugal without confronting any compelling resistance. The lack of Portugal resistance was vastly the only major reason that Junot was successful in his battle. The day before Junot reach Prince John he and his family fled the country.

According to Kenneth Johnson, “after the departure of royal family for the Portuguese colony of Brazil, the Portuguese crown restored in Brazil until the Liberal Revolution of 1820 which is a political revolution that helped the Portuguese Court to move back to Portugal and initiated the constitution.” (2010) From the time of departure to Brazil to the Liberal Revolution erupted, the capital of Portugal functioned in Rio de Jenario, which is respectively called “metropolitan reversal” (colony sovereignty over Portugal kingdom).

“In 1808, when Prince John, his family and the court arrived Rio de Janeiro, United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil and the Algarves is formed which, is a pluricontinental, meaning unified nation-state spreading around different land across multiple continents, monarchy created with the uprising of Portuguese colony and union of Kingdom of Brazil, Kingdom of Portugal and the Kingdom of Algarves, functioning as a single state with three different kingdoms.” (Gates, 2001) With the help of this new formation, Brazil was able to rise up to the same rank as Portugal, leading to the independence of Portugal. Such independence was gained in terms of administrative functions and via electing Brazilian representatives to the Portuguese Constitutional Courts.

Beside all these political instabilities, alternations and alterations, social developments and enhancements are made too. Commerce and industry is encouraged leading to vivid printing of newspapers and books. It is stated by Glover that “beside the intellectual, commercial and industrial innovations, medical schools, military academies, art academies, national banks and factories are presented improving the standard of living and making the environment much more habitable.” (1974) These incentives by Prince John helped Brazil to progress and develop and elevate its current status.

However with the economic independence of Brazil, the heir of John VI, respectively Pedro I, refused to return to Portugal, causing Portugal to enter a critical and vicious political crisis making it compulsory for John VI and the royal family to return to Portugal immediately. Portugal, with a vivid demand to Brazil, wanted them to return their former state and remain as a colony and forced the heir to return to Portugal. Aftermath was as expected; Pedro I was crowned in Rio de Janeiro ending Portugal’s hundreds of years sovereignty over Brazil. The events explained above were happened during Peninsular War, damaging opposite sides and allies respectively. As mentioned before, there were not only political conflicts resulting crisis or revolutions but also social instabilities and reforms influenced by those ongoing political wars.

Historical significance of the war

Regarding with the significance of the Peninsula War, comments, naturally, were relative. To exemplify, British scholars likely to evaluate this event as a prior to Napoleon’s downfall, like French emperor also emphasized the importance of event by mentioning as its “Spanish ulcer”. However, it is inevitable fact that the war made significant contributions to British military prestige. Irregular Spanish forces implemented the “guerilla” arms, which are introduced to the military jargon during the war and the model and the system of Spanish guerilla forces gained a general acceptance. On the other hand the war also influenced the Spanish colonies in revolting for their independence. “We can observe tons of examples that were inspired by the guerilla tactics of Iberian wars in the following centurie. Italian Guiseppe Garibaldi, American John Brown, the Boers of South Africa, T.E. Lawrence of Middle East, Michael Collins the irish Republican Army organizer, Tito, Ho Chi Minh, Che Guevara and lately Osama Bin Laden.” (Arnold, 2009) All of the names aforementioned followed the procedures of “underground warfare”, mostly known as “guerilla warfare”.

Personal comments

It can be accepted that Napoleon Bonaparth, even he has achieved to conquer some proportions of the Europe, was not a good commander and a leader. His leadership attributes are based on solely luck, otherwise he couldn’t manage to overtake most of the Europe. However in this case, we can observe how he skipped the major crucial precautions and measures before entering a war. Of course, the tactics of Spanish forces have been effective in this manner, but still French army was mostly not ready in complete terms. This is why, even though they were the victorious side of the fight, they had to deal with all the additional problems created by Spanish forces as well as guerillas. After being tested over and over again, their patience as well as their supplies and nerves have come near to be broken. Of course, they kept holding superiority over the Spanish forces, but the tired and destroyed Spanish forces could somehow keep fighting despite all the harm given to them.

This is why, regarding the Peninsular case, the mistakes made by Napoleon cannot be ignored. He should have studied his enemy before entering a war with Spain in order to understand their tactics deeply and to be ready for any surprises that his forces might come up with. Maybe then his forces would not have to deal with so many problems even though they were in the winner position.

It should also be taken into consideration that, he was not failed only to notice important details before the war but also throughout the war, he again failed to see important points, yielding a six year long fights, many casualties and changes in world’s political and economic balances.

Conclusion

In a nutshell, it is widely accepted that the Peninsular War is one of the biggest miscalculations of Napoleon and the most effective event in accelerating downfall of the empire. he couldn’t guess that the war would extend to six year period since he didn’t know the conservative and religious people of Spain and Portuguese. This is not only failure of Napoleon. Above all, he did not enough inspection before reaching the region, he was not expecting hot and warm weather which put them in difficulties in terms of searching water resources. Since the climate also influences the food resources, they had troubles in nutrition of the army. Due to Napoleon’s despotic and inconsistent attitudes put him back to ever demand information and advice for others. That is how he failed to notice the weather conditions and also Spanish background.

Before arriving Spain, he Also, he exceedingly magnified the current assets and wealth of Spanish material and natural resources, the possession of which could be an advantage in his struggle against Britain. Additionally, his contacts in Spain consisted of the Bourbon royal family who were famous with their incompetence, corruption, and decadence. On the other hand, Napoleon tent to underestimate the power and the size of the soldiers and the officers of the Britain. Even after uprisings, he couldn’t monitor the seriousness of the event which was stemmed from stubborn Spanish and Portuguese opponents. Not only failures of Napoleon led France to lose the war but also allies between Britain, Spain and Portuguese caused the defeat of French from Iberia.

Irregular Spanish forces, known as “guerilla bands”, become inspiration for all communities who fight for their independence and also provide examples for many rebellions through following centuries. The political structure of America has changed due to the collapse of the Spanish and Portuguese colonies. Six year war also had adverse effects on both production and internal trade. Both of the countries have suffered from it and consequently the war transformed the future of both countries.

Works Cited

  • Arnold, James R. “Albuera 1811: The Bloodiest Battle of the Peninsular War (review).” The Journal of Military History, Volume 73, Number 2, April 2009, pp. 639-64. Web.
  • Dendle, Brian J. (1991) “The Romance of War or the Highlanders in Spain: the Peninsular War and the British Novel.” University of Kentucky, 49-64. Web.
  • Esdaile, Charles. The Peninsular War: a New History. London: Penguin, 2002. Print.
  • Johnson, Kenneth G. “The Peninsular War: Napoleon’s Maritime War.” Air Command and Staff College, 2010. Web.
  • Oman, Charles. A History of the Peninsular War: Volume 1. London: Clarendon Press, 1902. Print.
  • “There are histories of the Peninsular War by W. F. P. Napier (rev. ed. 1856, repr. 1970), H. R. Clinton (3d ed. 1890), C. W. C. Oman (7 vol., 1902–30), M. Glover (1974).
  • Gates, David (29 October 2001). The Spanish Ulcer: A History of the Peninsular War. Da Capo Press. ISBN 978-0-7867-4732-0.

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