"Was Marmont a traitor or a realist?" Topic

The campaign of France was a strange one. Many people say it was the campaign of a much younger Napoleon than the one who fought in Russia or at Leipzig. The French armies were everywhere at once, and Napoleon won victory after victory.

The only trouble was that this didn't amount to much. The allies had finally learned the lesson that they were inferior to the man they were fighting, and simply ignored his attacks, concentrating on objectives instead.

By the time Marmont 'betrayed' Napoleon, Napoleon had an army estimated at about 14,000 men. The allies had hundreds of thousands in France, and they were not going any place. They were also not going to let Napoleon stay on the throne, just so they'd have to do all of this over again (which, of course, they nearly did).

In my view, Marmont only did what had to be done to keep more French blood from flowing, and more French cicites from being wrecked. Forcing the allies to fight to the point that they would have to capture and hang Napoleon would have accomplished nothing else.

Of course, there are other valid views on this, and I'd enjoy reading about them.

I agree with you. Marmont did what was right for France; Napoleon had lost track of his duty to France long before (if he ever had it!).

"Soldiers are made on purpose to be killed."
Napoleon 1

"In order to have good soldiers, a nation must always be at war."
Napoleon 1

A man who thinks like this deserves no loyalty.
Marmont was right and overdue!
Colin

Realist, by this point the French had to think about saving France not Napoleon.

Sure, but when Churchill was burbling about fighting on beaches and never surrendering, we would have hailed Montogomery as a realist and hero if he had surrendered the 8th Army to Rommel, in order to spare bloodshed and ruin?

Likewise, we lift the French government onto our shoulders for surrendering in 1940 when they were defeated, to spare loss of life and ruin?

Malcolm,

That Churchill speech was made long before Montgomery was fighting Rommel with the 8th Army, so that is rather irrelevant.

The key thing is what is in the best interest of the country; in 1814 Napoleon was not fighting in the best interest of France but of himself. Surrendering to Nazi Germany would not have been in the best interest of the UK, especially at a point where successful resistance was still possible.

Sure, but when Churchill was burbling about fighting on beaches and never surrendering, we would have hailed Montogomery as a realist and hero if he had surrendered the 8th Army to Rommel, in order to spare bloodshed and ruin?

Likewise, we lift the French government onto our shoulders for surrendering in 1940 when they were defeated, to spare loss of life and ruin?

A valid point Malcom, although personally I don't think Sir Winston Churchill can ever have been accused of 'burbling'…

However, I don't think the Allied armies in France in 1814 can be compared to a German Wehrmacht in England in 1940. The invasion of France was the result of the Allies responding to a long series of expansionist wars initiated by Napoleon, and the invasion had the full support of the legitimate French head of state, the King.

A comparison to a German commander surrendering to the Allies in 1945 would be more appropriate…

Continually overlooked or "passed over" might also be accurate.

Surely that's a false dichotomy.

Marmont became a symbol of betrayal to the French but how many tens of thousands of Frenchmen abandoned Napoleon by wandering off to safer areas to wait it out.
hating Marmont just made it easier for them to live with their own conscience

"Sure, but when Churchill was burbling about fighting on beaches and never surrendering, we would have hailed Montogomery as a realist and hero if he had surrendered the 8th Army to Rommel, in order to spare bloodshed and ruin?"

Ditto. It would have been very different if Rommel had been driving his tanks through Piccadilly Circus at the time.

Marmont did what was right for Marmont, and claimed it was for France. Remember the guy in the silk stocking claimed the same motivation.
Article 411-2 prohibits "handing over troops belonging to the French armed forces, or all or part of the national territory, to a foreign power, to a foreign organisation or to an organisation under foreign control, or to their agents". A Traitor !

So, where the men who planned and carried out the July 1944 bomb plot against Hitler traitors or realists? They too were breaking both the law and their oath to Hitler.

Personally, I feel that Marmont was doing the right thing by going against the law; sometimes one must do what is morally right rather than follow the law.

Traitor.

There's such thing as military honour.
Did Marmont go to Napoleon & say he'd fight no more?
No he surrendered to the Allies seeking post-war preferment.

His betrayal was about him not about the soldats or la Belle France.

It is unfair to make surrender heroic when our enemies do it and cowardly when our forces consider it. Likewise, the 'crime' of treason cannot be mitigated by who won out in the end. Also, spying for one side is exactly the same as spying for the other.

The Japanese defending Iwo Jima stand head and shoulders above Davy Crockett for heroic last stands, don'tcha think?

Back on point, if we give merit to Marmont's actions then surely we find fault with every general who did not desert with his corps when he personally felt that the war was lost.

Military honor dictates that Marmont resign his command if his conscience can no long follow his military superior's orders. Unilaterally surrendering his command to the enemy while the command still has a reasonable ability to resist was the act of a traitor.

Marshal Marmont was not in the same situation as Field Marshal Paulus at the Battle of Stalingrad.

"His betrayal was about him not about the soldats or la Belle France."

None of these guys were saints. Not the silk stocking filled with excrement, not the guy who got the period named after him, not Marmont, and not even Nosey, for that matter.

But that is not the same as saying that selfish people never do the right thing. Speer did the right thing in not following Hitler's order to raze Germany. Whatever else he may have been, he did the right thing that day.

IMHO, ditto for Ragusa.

The war was done. France doomed. Marmot did right by France, Right by his men and wrong by Napoleon.
So I reckon this will depend on where your sympathy lies.. With France, with the fighting man? Then Marmonts decision was just and right. If your sympathy lies with Boney then I guess he is a traitor.

But then Napolon had joined the French army BEFORE the revolution and betrayed his King, he also betrayed Corsican nationalism which he was a fervent supporter at one point.

Edwulf,

I respectfully disagree with you that whether Marmont was a traitor or not is based upon sympathies. My sympathy is anti-Napoleon but I still believe Marmont's act was traitorous. I believe military honor dictates he should have resigned his command rather than surrendering it. I believe Marmont's own officers and men condemned him for surrendering them. However, honest judgments will differ and I respect those who's opinions differ from mine.

God bless,
John

"None of these guys were saints."

Really? :)

link

I agree with Karpathian.

From the position of a soldier, its quite black and white (unfortunately). It is not a soldier's position to make judgements on right vs wrong, or to apply their opinion on what constitutes the greater good.

For as long as you hold a commission, your conducts is strictly bound by a well defined set of rules. Marmont's actions were well outside of those rules, without any doubt.

Whether those actions were ultimately for the better is another issue. It is pointless trying to pass judgements on the military actions of men in uniform from a civilian perspective.

Was he a traitor ? YES. determining that fact is a simple and objective matter. He stepped outside the rules that he agreed to observe when he donned the uniform.

Was he a realist ? YES

Can someone be a traitor and a hero at the same time ? Undoubtedly. History is full of such examples.

Did he do 'the right thing' by France ? .. subjectively, at the time, probably yes … depending on your point of view.

The problem with history and politics is that every little event seems to have longer term consequences that are impossible to forsee at the time of the event.

Who knows ? Maybe if things went differently at the time, then events across the border may have swung in a different direction some 50 years later. In the aftermath of the Napoleon I, we have Napoleon III and Bismark at their respective helms. The position they found themselves in being a direct consequence of the aftermath of Napoleon's demise.

All of this leads to the conditions that give birth to 3 spectres that dominated events in the West for the following century.

- Prussian military nationalism truly awakes in Mittel Europa for the first time.

- The Paris commune kicks off a new school of political thought that leads directly to Marx and Lenin.

- Events in Britain allow the Rothschilds to clean up the stock market with the news of Napoleon's defeat. This leads to a subtle shift in power in Europe, and the rise of a new type of player in the field of politics.

Those 3 forces are then locked in a death struggle for the next 100 years, spawning a number of increasingly destructive wars that touch every nation in the world.

Now, nobody can say for sure that these 3 developments would have happened anyway regardless of the outcome of 1815.

In hindsight them, could Marmont have made any difference ? No idea.

My personal opinion though – I think the events of October 14, 1806 set in motion the whole rollercoaster ride, and by the winter of 1812, it was done deal that could not be stopped.

-

I wonder how opinions on this split between those who have been in the military and those who have not.

Technically, Marmont betrayed Napoleon and was, therefore, a traitor to him. However, by surrendering his forces to the enemy, he effectively ended the war, which would not have happened if he had resigned. This prevented further pointless death, suffering and destruction. The issue here is about where an officer's duty lies; in Marmont's case was it with his country or Napoleon? As Napoleon was not acting in the best interest of France, I believe he was acting properly in bringing about the end of the war.

Both.

This prevented further pointless death, suffering and destruction.

I've never considered whether Marmont's precipitate surrender allayed a crushing and final defeat for Napoleon, allowing Napoleon the credibilty to return in 1815.

So, a traitor AND an agent in the needless spilling of blood (& what Karpathian said).

Steve64,

Well said.

God bless,
John

Karpathian,

That is a fallacious argument; one should only judge the actions and decisions of others on the information available to them at the time. Marmont could not know that his actions might open the door to an encore appearance from Napoleon so that should be disregarded. His actions were in the best interest of France at the time that he carried them out.

Steve64,

The Paris commune did not kick off "..a new school of political thought that leads directly to Marx…". By the time of the Commune, Marx had already published The Communist Manifesto (1848) and Capital: Critique of Political Economy (1867). The reality is actually the reverse of your statement.

There are many more recent examples where defeat was inevitable and the commanders on the spot decided that surrender was the only reasonable option. Why pick on Marmont?

@colinjallen.

I think it was a speculation & certainly an interesting one.

You do seem to see Marmont's motives as being entirely disinterested. Are you sure he wasn't in it for himself? Later actions seem to point to a very ambitious man.

XV Brigada,

Why pick on Marmont?
1. Napoleonic Discussion Board.
2. Not everyone believed then or now that Marmont's surrender was the only reasonable option.
3. Because baseballs don't have feathers.

God bless,
John

Ochoin,
I do not think for one moment that Marmont was disinterested. He may have done what he did for purely personal reasons but it was still the right thing to do.

@pedrobear

Okay, you win. ONE of them was a saint.

On a more serious note, Edwulf raises an interesting point. Is a traitor to a traitor still a traitor? Napoleon betrays the king, and Marmont betrays Napoleon.

In the end, the only moral compass is about what is right at this moment. If I know that shooting the tearful little girl clutching her teddy bear will stop Hitler 100 years hence, I still don't shoot her.

A traitor to a traitor is still a traitor. When you take an oath of service, like an oath of marriage, it is not 'until something better comes along' or 'unless it sucks'. When you give a traitor your oath, you are bound to it.

Malcolm,

Were the July 1944 bomb plotters right or wrong to try to kill Hitler?

I'm not a supporter of assassination at any time.

If it was 'right' for soldiers to try to kill Hitler then it is right for any soldier who feels so compelled to try to assassinate their commanders and political leaders.

If it was right for them to try to kill Hitler, then it was right for the communists to kill the Czar and it would be right for the CIA to kill the Kennedys.

It makes it right to wear a uniform and display loyalty while conspiring to commit murder against those you have sworn to support IN ALL CASES.

The correct action in their case would have been to take off their uniforms, desert, put on the uniforms of their state's enemies, and then fight for their beliefs.

Malcolm,

Then we will never agree. I firmly believe that there are rare occasions when it is the duty of a member of the armed forces to go against his or her oath, when doing so is in the best interest of their country or of humanity in general.

If German officers attempting to kill Hitler is something that you regard as wrong, then I do not really know what is left to say to you, especially as the alternative action that you recommend would also have been classed as treason.

You ought to change your statement to read:

I firmly believe that there are rare occasions when it is the duty of a member of the armed forces to go against his or her oath, when doing so is PERSONALLY THOUGHT TO BE in the best interest of their country or of humanity in general.

I believe that no soldier should follow an illegal order and that they have a duty to question what they believe to be illegal orders and arrest, if necessary, anyone giving a illegal order. I do not believe that we ought give soldiers the duty to assassinate their officers based on their personal beliefs.

I don't mind never agreeing with you, Colin.

…and yes, deserting and taking up arms against your nation would be treason. Sometimes you will find yourself caught between two bad choices. Doing it for 'the right reasons' doesn't stop it from being treason and therefore morally repugnant.

Malcolm,

I am amazed that you find the idea of German officers attempting to kill Hitler morally repugnant. I would regard it as morally admirable.

"If it was 'right' for soldiers to try to kill Hitler then it is right for any soldier who feels so compelled to try to assassinate their commanders and political leaders."

That doesn't follow. It implies moral relativism, and if moral relativism is the standard, then this question has no meaning, so why bother with it?

For this to make any sense at all, there has to be a standard of right and wrong, but you seem to be implying that the only standard of right and wrong is one's duty to one's commander. There are many other possible standards, however, such as duty to one's country, people, mercy towards humanity right off the top of my head.

What makes an oath more important than any other form of duty? If you take an oath to Napoleon, and he orders you to kill your mother, what then?

Friends, this is going far afield. By any military standard that I know of, Napoleon's gave no illegal orders to Marmont. I recommend going back and reading Steve64's post.

God bless,
John

Malcolm,

My problem with your argument is that you assume universalism, whereas situationalism is actually more appropriate.

Given the nature of the Nazi government, it clearly seems to me that attempting to remove that government and bring the war to a negotiated end (however unlikely that latter outcome was) was a greater and more important duty than following an oath to the head of that government.

Background on the subject…

TMP link

TMP link

Amicalement
Armand

Very well then. Allow soldiers to make moral judgemental calls on the evil of their leaders, and if they believe that it was the morally just thing to do, we will call it morally admirable.

We will call it morally admirable if we agree with them or not, because we celebrate their decisiveness and moral courahe. We will celebrate it in our fellows, our enemies, and our criminal courts. Soldiers must murder their leaders that they believe to be evil, or they are cowards.

Malcolm,

In the case of the July 1944 plotters, we should celebrate their courage; sadly, their decisiveness was lacking:(.

Returning to Marmont, continuing the war would only have resulted in more deaths, more maimed young men, more destruction and the same outcome; it was better to end the war sooner rather than later. Having been in a war and seen what it does to people, I see fighting on when it serves no purpose and when one is not threatened by an enemy of the nature of Nazi Germany or Soviet Russia as being morally repugnant.

Yes, Marmont betrayed Napoleon but it was the best and most realistic thing to do.

I'm not Marmont but I played him in a recent PBEM 1813 campaign. Let me assure you that my Marmont was a sterling character who would always remain true to his oath. Yeah, that's the ticket.

"Yes, Marmont betrayed Napoleon but it was the best and most realistic thing to do."

And then the traitor Marmont sat on the court that condemned Ney to a firing squad. Marmont was one of those who voted for the death penalty. Irony of Ironies.

God bless,
John

It gets me thinking about Marc Antony's words about Brutus at the end-in the aftermath of Phillipi. Or at least the way Shakespeare put it.

"And then the traitor Marmont sat on the court that condemned Ney to a firing squad. Irony of Ironies."

This post has made me realize just how silly I AM in starting this thread, and how little sense it actually makes.

In fairness, the only difference between Ney, the Bravest of the Brave, and Marmont, the Arch-Traitor, is that Marmont changed sides one time less than Ney did. I'm also not sure that Marmont ever said he would bring Bonaparte back in an iron cage.

Sorry, guys. I won't do this again.

John,

Irony indeed. Marmont was sensible enough not to change sides again when Napoleon returned, which shows that he probably had far better judgement than Ney.

Old Slow Trot,

Fine words they were indeed!