Thread 17939360

>be barely functional mess with no allies, hyperinflation, collapsing governments, factionalism, bread riots and literal civil war in half the country
>somehow solo all of Europe
what

But they lost

>>17939360 (OP)
>Pic unrelated, it's Germany

>>17939363
They actually didn't. Napoleon lost.

>>17939360 (OP)
the common explanation is that france and was the first "industrialized' nation to conscript their population and run a full "war economy"
idk how right that is though

ESPRIT DE CORPS

>>17939360 (OP)
universal conscription was revolutionary. They didn't just draw soldiers from their own country but all the places they conquered too

>>17939360 (OP)
>The French citizen army, inspired by revolutionary zeal, repelled the Prussians and Austrians at Valmy.
>Goethe, who was present to witness the defeat of the coalition forces, wrote that “From this day forth begins a new era in the history of the world, and you can all say that you were present here at its birth.”

>Centralized country with the highest population wins
No shit

>>17939459
Permanently fugged frogs or they'd be as numerous as Russians.

>>17939360 (OP)
>>somehow solo all of Europe
>what
IIRC the Revolutionary army had a million men while the rest of the coalition didn't have more than 300,000. France was able to lose and lose and lose again and again until they won. And when the coalition lost, they couldn't raise another army.

>>17939360 (OP)
mass mobilization of the lower classes
wars up until that point had been fought with mercenaries supplementing small highly trained professional armies because the various kings and dukes were afraid of giving every random guy military training lest they revolt
the french republic saw itself as derived from the people not ruling over them, so there was much less fear of a lower class revolution toppling the new government. france also had by far the largest population of any country in western/central europe which made it even harder for coalition forces to contest them.
ironically, the early modern monarchs were right in fearing mass mobilization since almost all european monarchies were toppled following the world wars, in which entire countries were mobilized to fight

>>17939360 (OP)
They did the swedish thing amd drafted their entire male population but unlike sweden France is really big so it worked till didnt

>>17939360 (OP)
>formally centralized AF. Just needs to flip the switch to become centralized for realz
>largest population of any nation
>everybody is already used to living in a shitty, totalitarian dictatorship with less regards for the law than the US Supreme Court
>most of its enemies initially didn't really care that much, being more concerned about securing their piece of Poland than about saving the life of Louis.
>the new rulers were lucky enough to tie most of the country to themselves by a massive sell-out of church&exiled nobility's property, by nullifying feudal servitudes on land and property and by tying the value of their currency to those land sales. Meaning all would be lost were the nation to fall.
>army life got better under the new regime. Even if it sucked materially, the political benefits even the lowliest soldier got out of service were significant
>most of the industry was apparently concentrated in Paris, over which the government never lost control to somebody unwilling to support the war effort.

>>17939587
>autocracy = totalitarian dictatorship
Retard.

>>17939597
Autocracies include Absolutist Monarchies, yes. The years of the Terror were a hilarious reprise of the ancient regime, in any case. The Intendants were back, taxation became arbitrary and solely based on the needs of the nation again, law became arbitrary and optional again, the constitution was no more and Lettres de cachet became invitations to the Place de Concord.
And it worked. The Ancient Regime, it turned out, already had all the tools required to take on all of Europe.

>>17939414
True. France had a huge population at the time, so conscription brought a big army. French soldiers were also highly motivated due to propaganda and the army being a powerhouse for republicans. The exil of officers from the nobility, whom now were choose based on merit instead of money/social ranks gave the opportunity for competent leaders to prove themselves and emerge from the rank.

>>17939363
They won. The Treaty of Amiens in 1800 ended the war of revolution. But the napoleonics war started shortly after

>>17939414
>>17939652
It had basically the same population as Austria and the Ottoman Empire. Germany had a bigger population advantage in the world wars than France did here.

>>17939587
No, industry was not too much concentrated in Paris. Well, it was a big city so of course, it also had a lot of manufactures. But many vital industry for the war effort were scattered in provinces : muskets were made in Charleville, near Belgium and canons were produced in the south-west of France

>>17939629
The reign of terror is one of few regimes before the 20th century that you could call totalitarian, but only with the asterisk that the technology and infrastructure they had at the time put them far away from being as invasive in the lives of its citizens and in all aspects of society as the regimes the term was coined for were.
For most absolute monarchies, however, the term is entirely inappropriate. They were merely authoritarian, they stayed out of peoples lives as long as the people stayed out of politics.

>>17939677
>They were merely authoritarian, they stayed out of peoples lives as long as the people stayed out of politics.
They didn't have the right to refuse the regime's agent, Anon. They didn't have the right to sue them either, because that was an affront to their good king.
Some dude would literally walk into the village every year and tell you that one of you was to be held liable for the whole community's annual tax now. That person now was on a countdown to collect the sum from their neighbors and would have his door and roof shingles sold off to make up the difference, if any remained. The neighbors had zero incentive to cooperate with you and the sum was annually changed based on how little communities with better access to notables and the notables within the province themselves wanted to pay of it.
And, if you happened to visit a city and a nobleman's carriage happened to run you over, you had to proof that it was its front wheels that crushed you, because it was insensible to require the coachman to mind the back wheels. Of course, the nobleman could just ask to have the case moved to a court you had no access to and then talk it out among his friends and peers.

You know, all based tradchad stuff.

>>17939732
>They didn't have the right to refuse the regime's agent
We don't have the right to refuse the modern day taxman in our enlightened democracies so what's your point?
>you had to proof that it was its front wheels that crushed you, because it was insensible to require the coachman to mind the back wheels.
>the nobleman could just ask to have the case moved to a court you had no access to and then talk it out among his friends and peers.
Arbitrary laws and arbitrary courts is not totalitarianism.

>>17939732
yeah man i agree, everyone from before present year was a grubby retarded peasant incapable of any human agency until THE ENLIGHTENMENT taught them about like, how bad it was to not have laws, and stuff

>>17939739
You can, in fact, sue the taxman
you can demand to see on what basis your tax rates were decided on
there exist laws that very clearly define your tax rates, you have the right to demand those laws to be applied to your case
you both will be asked to appear in the same court, to stand before the same judge if you do.

>>17939742
The point being that the revolution happened because french absolutism was a garbled mess and kinda awful for anybody but a vanishingly small minority.
Like the most benign example would be the people in charge of censorship privately financing print runs of books they declared illegal as part of their day jobs, simply because the laws didn't apply to them and they happened to personally enjoy those books.

>>17939767
>You can, in fact, sue the taxman
Not being able to sue the taxman is not totalitarianism.
>The point being that the revolution happened because french absolutism was a garbled mess and kinda awful for anybody but a vanishingly small minority.
Life was kinda awful for anybody but a vanishing small minority in the entire god damn world in the 18th century.
Even the situation in France immediately prior to the Revolution was nothing particularly peculiar, government mismanagement combined with crop failure put a heavy burden on the populace, something that had happened countless times before all over the world. The ideas that sprung out of the Enlightenment is what made it different.

>>17939796
>Life was kinda awful for anybody but a vanishing small minority in the entire god damn world in the 18th century.
Nah, Maria Theresia at least stuck to her penal reform laws and the rest of continental Europe didn't wholly alienate the ruling class from their economic basis and legal and political functions the way french absolutism did.

Like when De Sade tried to re-introduce some of the formalities of feudalism on his family's estate on a lark, he found out that nobody had done that for two generations and he literally had to educate his peasants about what they were supposed to do when being called into his presence, based on archival documents. France was absolutely ready to collapse.