Major General James Cowan CBE DSO
"To many, Waterloo seems a million miles away, a pre-industrial war of extravagant uniforms, utterly at odds with the drab reality of 21st Century conflict. But these were real men, who experienced real conflict, many of whom lived well into the 19th Century.
In many ways Waterloo was an aberration, an unexpected coda to a war that had seemingly reached a decisive climax the year before. Napoleon had been defeated and despatched to his exile on Elba. Europe was rid of the Corsican ogre. The Russian, Austrian and Prussian monarchs could control Jacobin excess. Britain would be free to reap the profits of its maritime and economic power, its strategy of limited continental liability vindicated. France would strive for a settlement between Royalists, Bonapartists, Republicans and Liberals.
The return of Napoleon threw all this in the air. Unlike the slower-burn events of 1789-1792, the 100 Days arose from nothing and demanded urgent answers, with armies mobilised and policy created on the hoof. It is against this background that the relevance of Waterloo must be determined, for there is something different about the campaign of 1815 that marks it out from what went before.
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