Napoleon came to power in France due to his skills as a soldier" To what extent is this a fair assessment of Napoleon's rise to power?

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Bernardo Teixeira

History – 10 M

Mr. Philip Briggs

“Napoleon came to power in France due to his skills as a soldier” To what extent is this a fair assessment of Napoleon’s rise to power.

The statement: “Napoleon came to power in France due to his skills as a soldier”, can be said to be a fair evaluation of Napoleon’s rise to power only until a certain extent. Other aspects of Napoleon’s life need to be explored to explain how he came to full power in France by 1804. These are: his education, the situation France was in, the support of the army he had, the effective propaganda used by him, his skills as a leader, and of course, the luck he had of all these events getting together and casting him as emperor of France. Let us analyze all of these events and see to which point is this statement a fair assessment to Napoleon’s rise to power.

Firstly and most importantly, to verify the fairness of this statement lets see the importance of his military skills in his life. In 1785, Napoleon entered the Ecole Militaire Paris; where he was the first Corsican ever, to graduate as a sub-lieutenant of artillery. From this point on, he continued to train his artillery skills for four more years. After hard military training, in 1793 Napoleon received his first opportunity to show his potential. It was in the Toulon battle where he helped the French army to regain Toulon from the British. At this battle, young Bonaparte proved his loyalty to his superior when he was asked to substitute him but denied it and also showed his competence when he convinced his superior to attack the British at the right time. After this victory, his superior officer wrote a letter to the minister of war acknowledging Napoleon as a brilliant young military talent, contempling his bravery, intelligence and character.  In March 1796, Napoleon was appointed commander of the army in Italy. This was the chance Napoleon was waiting to prove his magnificent military skills. The skills, which led him to power, were not only proved in the battle of Italy but also in the battle at Egypt in 1796 3 years later.

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Another aspect of Napoleon’s escalade to power was his background and education. Napoleon was of a noble Corsican family, his father was a bitter opponent of the foreign French occupation of the island. However, with the advantages he could obtain to his family by being an ally of the French government, Bonaparte’s father became one of the men who took care of the French administration of the island. With this, he obtained documentary proof of French nobility. This enabled him to send young Napoleon to study in France. Napoleon was given a crash course in France as soon as he ...

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