Politicians, like gamblers, can destroy themselves by overreach. Grasping for more, they often lose what they have gained—for gamblers, money; for politicians, a respected legacy of accomplishment. For example, Lyndon Johnson ended his lifetime of constructive leadership by overreach into Vietnam. Having achieved détente with Moscow and normal ties with Beijing, Richard Nixon destroyed his administration by dirty tricks against his political opponents at home. Early in the 19th century, Napoleon Bonaparte lost nearly all he had gained by overreaching into Russia and–having regained some power–suffering major defeats at Waterloo.
Joe Biden rightly reminds voters what he and his teams have done for America, but gratitude and memory are in short supply. Many voters ask, “What have you done for me lately?” and “What will you do for me in the next four years?”
Like President Biden, Napoleon could boast of reforms that made his country a better place to live. Some of Napoleon’s policies contradicted today’s liberal values. But the 1804 Napoleonic Code influenced civil law codes across the world. Napoleon established a system of public education, abolished vestiges of feudalism, emancipated Jews and other religious minorities, enacted the principle of equality before the law for an emerging middle class.
Resting on his laurels. Napoleon risked several not-so-bad presents for remote goals that prudence warned could be unattainable. Not content with improving France, Napolean expanded French dominion over much of Europe. Some Europeans welcomed French influence as enlightenment. Others, like Beethoven, saw it not as liberation but as oppression. Still, Napoleon kept moving eastward, like Hitler, and 133 years later, Napoleon used summer’s longest days to invade Russia in 1812. Muddy roads and other logistic problems led his Grand Armée to suffer huge losses of troops, horses, and artillery before the fighting even began. Unwilling to bow to geographical realities, Napoleon used forced marches of his depleted forces to reach Moscow in just four months. But the Kremlin and city were deserted. The lack of supplies and the first snows pushed Napoleon to start a perilous retreat to France in October.
Less than a quarter of the Grand Armée survived the entire campaign. Out of an original force of some 615,000, only 110,000 frostbitten and half-starved survivors stumbled back.
Still hoping (like Putin) to defeat a European coalition he had spurred to resist him, Napoleon mobilized his decimated forces in 1814 to fight a nearly united Europe—and lost. A Russian army led by Emperor Alexander I triumphantly marched into Paris in March 1814. The capture of the French capital was the final battle of the War of 1812, after which Napoleon I abdicated.
Exiled to Elba, six miles from the Tuscan coast, Napoleon retained the title of emperor. He lived in near regal splendor and ruled the island’s 12,000 inhabitants. Tending to his shrunken empire with gusto, in his 300 days as Elba’s ruler Napoleon ordered and oversaw massive infrastructure improvements: building roads and draining marshes, boosting agriculture and developing mines, as well as overhauling the island’s schools and its entire legal system.
Not content with his Mediterranean paradise, Napolean returned to Paris in March 1815 just as the Congress of Vienna was returning France to its borders of 1792 and a respected place in the family of nations. He assembled another army and again fought a coalition of Europe’s major powers, led and financed by France’s archrival, Great Britain. Defeated at Waterloo (near Brussels) on June 18, Napoleon abandoned his broken army again and returned to Paris, where he abdicated one day later. The Allies reentered Paris on July 7. A restored King Louis XVIII arrived the next day. Napoleon journeyed to the west coast, where he surrendered himself to the commander of the HMS Bellerophon on July 15. No longer allowed to call himself emperor, this time he was exiled at St. Helena in the South Atlantic, dying there six years later at age 51.
Napoleon seriously harmed France not just by himself but with the acquiescence if not the approval of the French public. Many leaders let power go to their head, but they are usually supported by interest groups and large segments of the population, sometimes swayed by uninformed or falsely formed emotions. Not just the faltering US president but American voters– regardless their political leanings– should ponder these dangers.
About the Author: Dr. Walter Clemens
Walter Clemens is Associate, Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies, Harvard University, and Professor Emeritus of Political Science, Boston University. He wrote Blood Debts: What Do Putin and Xi Owe Their Victims (2023).

Pingback: Israel Must Go 'Scorched Earth' on Hezbollah - NationalSecurityJournal