- 7 months ago
AccuWeather Founder & Executive Chair and author of "Invisible Iceberg: When Climate & Weather Shaped History" Dr. Joel Myers and Bernie Rayno unravel the dramatic tale of Napoleon Bonaparte's ill-fated Russia campaign.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00Welcome to Invisible Iceberg, I'm Bernie Raynaud.
00:07On today's show, we unravel the dramatic tale of Napoleon Bonaparte's ill-fated Russian
00:12campaign, and we explore how the Russian winter turned victory into disaster, marking the
00:19beginning of the end for one of history's greatest military leaders.
00:22Plus, we break down the vital topic of hypothermia and how to protect yourself in cold weather.
00:31It all starts now on Invisible Iceberg.
00:38In 1806, Napoleon Bonaparte seemed unstoppable, but nature had other plans, and his grand army
00:47marched into Russia.
00:48They were met with extreme weather conditions that would change the course of history.
00:54From severe thunderstorms and sweltering heat to the infamous Russian winter, the elements
00:59wreaked havoc on Napoleon's forces.
01:03This is just one of the riveting stories explored in the book, Invisible Iceberg, When Climate
01:07and Weather Shaped History.
01:10Joining us right now is Accuade, the founder and executive chairman and author of the book,
01:14Invisible Iceberg, When Climate and Weather Shaped History, Dr. Joel Myers.
01:18Dr. Joel, thanks for joining us today.
01:20My pleasure.
01:21We've got to get right to this chapter, all right, because there's a lot to talk about.
01:25It's Napoleon and Russia.
01:28Let's talk about what the status of Emperor Napoleon was in 1806.
01:35Napoleon was a charismatic leader and a great general.
01:42He was considered one of the greatest generals in history, even though in the end he lost.
01:47So you think about France, supported the United States during the revolution, a very powerful
01:54country.
01:55They had taken part of Italy and part of Germany, and they owned all of Holland and Belgium, part
02:02of Spain.
02:04So they were really the empire.
02:06And the two opposing countries were England and Russia on the outskirts.
02:12But they really controlled the whole Europe, Western Europe.
02:18And it came to a point, finally, that Russia and the UK said, we're not going to pay all
02:25these tariffs anymore and so on.
02:27And so they defied Napoleon.
02:29So he said, that's not going to stand.
02:32He raised an army, 650,000 people.
02:36Just think of that.
02:37I mean, the population of Europe was much, much less than it is today.
02:40It's very charismatic.
02:41And he decided to teach, as he called them, the barbarians to the north, the Russians, a
02:47lesson.
02:48So what was Napoleon's plan?
02:50He planned to capture Moscow, which is the capital of Russia.
02:56Russia, and he knew they didn't want to do it in wintertime.
03:01So he started off in the spring, and he figured he would be in Moscow by the middle of summer
03:08at the latest.
03:09They'd have a victory parade.
03:11The Russians would surrender, and he'd grab a lot of the riches and spoils, and that would
03:18be the end.
03:19He would defeat them, and they wouldn't bother him anymore, and they would kowtow to his wishes.
03:24You know, they marched, and they won, but then the weather intervened.
03:30It was the spring, and even though a hailstorm occurred, cold rain, but with the hail, and
03:39that damaged a lot of the horses and the troops, and it was the first setback, because then
03:46it was followed by cold weather, and some of them got sick, and so on, even though it
03:49was heading into summer.
03:50Because when you think of Russia, you think of the winter, but during the summertime, you
03:56mentioned, they had extreme weather then, too, from the rain, and at times it was so hot
04:02that a lot of the French troops suffered dehydration.
04:06Yeah.
04:07The weather can be very hostile.
04:08And it was, so after the hailstorm and the cold, and they're recovering from that, then
04:13it went to the other extreme.
04:14It got very hot.
04:16Very hot and dry.
04:17They had no water.
04:18They were drinking urine from the horses to survive.
04:23And then because of rains off and on, it got muddy, and they couldn't move the cannons,
04:30and so on.
04:31So a lot of hostilities.
04:35But they were making progress, but they were losing people along the way.
04:40And then there was finally a battle, short of Moscow, Bordino, which is a famous battle
04:46in all the Russian history books, actually, even though it was a tie.
04:50And that actually happened, according to the book, in September.
04:56So from June, July, August, there virtually wasn't any battles between Napoleon and Russia.
05:05Correct.
05:05So the Russian strategy was let an invading force exhaust itself.
05:11We don't have to win any decisive battle, because we're not going to, because we're outnumbered.
05:16So then the Russians retreated, they went back to Moscow, they took out all the food
05:23from Moscow, they left the alcohol, and they set the city on fire.
05:29When the French arrived, there was plenty of alcohol, no food, the place was burning.
05:38And so what happened?
05:40You know, they just drank, and were merry, and were waiting for the Russians to surrender.
05:46Because that's how it was done in the war.
05:47But the Russians had no intention to surrender.
05:50Because they knew they had one factor on their side the upcoming winter.
05:57And we're going to get to the Russian winter and what happened after Moscow in just a minute
06:05or two, coming up here in our next segment.
06:08Here now with more perspective is Howard G. Brown, a historian of France and history professor
06:14at Binghamton University, State University of New York.
06:19Mr. Brown, thank you for joining us here today.
06:22Thank you for having me.
06:24What did Russian Tsar Alexander I do to challenge Napoleon?
06:29At the Peace of Tilsit in 1807, they had sort of agreed that they would have broad spheres
06:34of influence.
06:36And that included kind of leaving Finland, which had been a part of Sweden, to the Tsar's grasp
06:43and let him deal with the Ottoman Empire as he wanted.
06:47But that left Napoleon free to deal with Central Europe, and even ultimately to create a kind
06:53of rump of Poland, which the Tsar didn't like.
06:56But this relationship began to break down.
06:59The last day of 1810, he decided to basically turn his back on the treaty that was giving
07:07Napoleon a financial and economic edge across Europe.
07:10This massively infuriated Napoleon, who by mid-1811 was already determined to invade Russia
07:18and teach the Tsar a lesson.
07:20Took him quite a while to get all of his forces together.
07:23But his invasion finally took place around the summer solstice of 1812.
07:29And how did the weather impact Napoleon's forces that summer and in the remainder of
07:34the season?
07:36Well, I'm glad you brought up the summer because the legend of the 1812 campaign is about the
07:42winter.
07:43And of course, the summer is the product of a continental climate where it can reach the
07:50high 90s, usually hot and dry.
07:52The French were not particularly well prepared to traverse what was pretty barren landscape.
07:59So they needed enormous supply trains and a huge number of horses, not just to pull artillery
08:04or, you know, saddle up the cavalry, but actually feed the troops.
08:07And this proved to be a particularly difficult obstacle to overcome in the summer because they
08:17didn't get enough fodder brought right to the horses at the front.
08:21So the horses started to eat the ripening grain or the grass and they weren't prepared for it.
08:28It gave them various forms of colic and killed thousands of horses.
08:33In fact, over the 175 days of the Russian campaign, the French forces lost about a thousand horses
08:41per day.
08:42What happened in the fall battles and what did Napoleon encounter when he reached Moscow?
08:48He took Smolensk in August, mid-August, and it was supposed to be a major supply depot for
08:56him.
08:56But ultimately, it was burned to the ground.
08:59And he eventually forced the Russians to take a stand.
09:03The Russians were not going to simply open up their historic capital.
09:08So at the Battle of Borodino, they decided they had good grounds, good terrain, and they
09:14faced down Napoleon's army, by which time it had shrunk enormously to about less than a
09:18third of its original size.
09:20But the battle was one of the most bloody of history.
09:24In fact, it was the bloodiest recorded battle in history until the Battle of the Somme in
09:281916, having at least 73,000 killed that day.
09:33And both sides claimed victory initially.
09:36The Russians, however, had to pull out.
09:39And Napoleon marched into Moscow on the 14th and 15th of September and learned very quickly
09:46that the Russian mayor of Moscow had been planning a sabotage campaign if the city was opened up
09:57to the French.
09:58And he ordered all the fire stations and fire pumps dismantled and let prisoners out and
10:06commanded them to set fire to the city.
10:08And so, in fact, Napoleon, after having already taken up residence in the Kremlin, had to leave
10:14the city and see it burned massively so that about two-thirds of Moscow was destroyed.
10:21Howard G.
10:21Brown, historian of France and history professor at Binghamton University, State University of
10:28New York.
10:29Thank you again for joining us today.
10:32Thank you very much.
10:33Still to come, we're talking all about hypothermia.
10:37Learn how to identify the warning signs and the dangers it poses.
10:41But next, we turn to the Russian winter.
10:44Find out how the bitter cold transformed Napoleon's powerful army into a defeated force.
11:03Welcome back to Invisible Iceberg.
11:05I'm Bernie Raynaud.
11:06We're back with AccuWeather, founder and executive chairman and author of the book, Invisible
11:10Iceberg, When Climate and Weather Shaped History, Dr. Joel Myers.
11:15It's the winter of 1806 in Russia near Moscow.
11:21Let's talk about what happened that winter in Russia.
11:24Well, in October, it was wild.
11:27And the conquering French troops were pillaging Moscow, enjoying themselves with lots of liquor,
11:35no food.
11:36And they were waiting for the Russians to surrender, which they never did.
11:40And then it turned cold.
11:43And they needed to get home.
11:45And so Napoleon didn't realize he was in trouble when this weather turned, did he not?
11:51Well, he expected he didn't want to be there.
11:53I don't know what the communications was.
11:55They knew they had to get out.
11:56Maybe they lingered a little longer because October was mild.
12:00And they were fooled.
12:01And then as it started to turn cold, you know, how do they get back?
12:05And it wasn't easy to get back because it was soggy, first of all.
12:07But it was, they couldn't move.
12:11Everything was bogged down and escape.
12:14And then it turned cold.
12:15And then they didn't have the clothes.
12:16They expected to win the war and get the heck out before winter came.
12:22And now it's getting cold.
12:23It's getting, and then it turned very cold, 35 below zero.
12:27I mean, everything froze.
12:29So they tried to then make skis out of the wheels.
12:33And still, it was a mess.
12:35So they couldn't get, they just were running for their lives, basically, back to France.
12:40Fewer and fewer troops because they were sicker and sicker.
12:43They had no food.
12:44They were starving.
12:45And they came to this river and no bridges.
12:49The Russians destroyed the bridges.
12:51They couldn't get across.
12:52And it was icy cold.
12:53It wasn't frozen.
12:54Yeah.
12:55But there were chunks of ice in the river.
12:57And it was ice cold.
13:00So they had to stop.
13:01And it took a week to build a bridge across.
13:04The river, more people dying to get across finally.
13:09And with their tails between their legs, less than 5%, only 30,000 of the 650,000 groups, less than 5%, made it back alive.
13:19It just seemed like, on their retreat, the weather didn't cooperate with them at all.
13:25You talked about, in Belarus, the river.
13:29If it had been frozen, if it was cold enough, they would have been able to cross it.
13:34But it wasn't.
13:35There were times where they were going where it was cold.
13:38And then it was, then it would, it would thaw.
13:40The weather completely was on the Russian side throughout this whole thing.
13:45And, of course, then the Russians didn't really engage them except for one time, fully.
13:51And, yeah, the weather really destroyed Napoleon's army.
13:56But the fascinating thing is, after that huge defeat, Napoleon was able to reconstitute another army.
14:03And then he was eventually exiled.
14:05And then he came back to cheering crowds.
14:07He was losing.
14:09He lost nearly a million Frenchmen in these various wars.
14:14And they still looked upon him as a hero.
14:17Finally, he had to hit his waterloo.
14:20And he had to step down because of all the foreign powers had basically surrounded France and caused it.
14:29But he must have been a tremendously charismatic leader.
14:33The people just followed him, whatever he wanted to do, after defeat, after defeat.
14:40Now, that came after brilliance.
14:42The people who study military history still consider him one of the greatest generals of all time.
14:47So Napoleon continues to retreat, retreat, retreat, lose more and more troops.
14:53And this event had a pretty big impact on what happened in Napoleon and France as we went into the future.
15:03Yeah, France was the most powerful empire in Europe before he attacked Russia.
15:09He lost over 600,000 troops of 650,000.
15:16So France was greatly weakened.
15:18And they had to gradually, over the years, give up more to the surrounding countries.
15:24But they still were a powerful country.
15:27But they were in debt and on the decline.
15:29But Napoleon kept raising new armies and fighting to try to extend again France's impact.
15:40But finally, they got weaker and weaker.
15:43And at the Battle of Waterloo, nine years later, that was the end of Napoleon's reign and a weakened France from that period on.
15:53There were impacts of all of these events on the United States.
15:58Well, before this, but explain.
16:02Well, if you look at the origin of the United States, clearly Britain had a big impact.
16:09We declared independence from Britain.
16:12But as far as the Constitution is concerned and the laws and the culture, it came from both Britain and France.
16:19Of course, the United States declared independence, which was an inspiration to some degree for the French Revolution that overthrew the monarchy and created more of a democracy, a republic in France.
16:34But still, Napoleon had a lot of power.
16:37But the debt and dealing with all the things they were dealing with led to France selling a big chunk of what became the United States to the United States, the Louisiana Purchase, which is about a quarter of the total land mass of the U.S.
16:52that the U.S. was able to buy, probably at a bargain price in 1804, and maybe some of that money Napoleon wanted to finance the upcoming war, which he lost then to Russia.
17:05From a historical perspective, how important was the Louisiana Purchase, the fact that we were able to buy that from France?
17:12Very important.
17:13Obviously, it's an important component of the United States.
17:16If there was a big gap that was still owned by France in the middle of what's now the United States, it would be a very different country.
17:24I want to thank Accu, the founder and executive chairman and author of the book, Invisible Iceberg, One Climate and Weather-Shaped History, Dr. Joe Myers, for joining us today.
17:33Coming up next, everything you need to know about hypothermia and how to stay safe in cold weather.
17:54Welcome back to Invisible Iceberg, I'm Bernie Raynaud.
18:06Hypothermia is a serious mental condition that occurs when the body's core temperature drops below 90 degrees Fahrenheit.
18:14The first symptoms of hypothermia include intense shivering, slurred speech, and a lack of coordination.
18:20As the condition progresses, mental confusion sets in, making it difficult to think clearly or make decisions.
18:28Victims may become disoriented and unable to perform simple tasks.
18:33When the body temperature drops further around 90 degrees Fahrenheit, shivering stops completely and muscles become rigid.
18:40Heart rate, breathing, and blood pressure all decrease significantly.
18:44The individual may become drowsy and eventually lose consciousness.
18:47In severe cases, if the body temperature continues to fall, vital organs like the heart and brain can fail, leading to death if not promptly treated.
18:59Immediate rewarming and medical intervention are crucial to prevent long-term damage and save lives.
19:06Methods of rewarming include moving the person to a warm, dry place, removing wet clothing, and using blankets or body heat.
19:13Warm, non-alcoholic beverages can help if the person is conscious.
19:19Hypothermia is a silent and dangerous condition that requires immediate attention and care to prevent fatal consequences.
19:27Awareness and preparedness are vital, especially in cold environments, to ensure safety and well-being.
19:34That's our show for today.
19:36For more information and get your copy of the book, Invisible Iceberg, When Climate and Weather Shapes History by Dr. Joel Myers, go to invisibleiceberg.com.
19:46And a big thanks to all of you for watching.
19:50If you have a question or comment, send us an email at questions at accuweather.com.
19:54We look forward to seeing you next time.
19:56We'll see you next time.
Comments