Are the Napoleonic wars the under pinning of WWI and WWII ?

Question

Sometimes I wonder if Napoleon's wars had not sewn the seed of such hatred and political intrigue between the continental european powers that we would never have had a valid reason to have WWI.

Answer 1

No. Germany, France, Austria, and England were at it for centuries before Napoleon Bonaparte. To get to the beginning, you have to go to Louis Napoleon III, his nephew, and Emperor of the French from 1852-1870. Also Otto von Bismarck, Chancellor of Prussia, then of united Germany, under King Wilhelm IV of Prussia, later Kaiser Wilhelm I of Germany.

In 1870, France and Prussia went to war over a silly affair called the Ems telegram. Prussia trounced France almost at once at the battle of Sedan and went on to besiege Paris. In the peace treaty signed at Versailles in 1871, France lost Alsace and Lorraine to Germany, whose unification and empire were also proclaimed in the Hall of Mirrors.

Naturally the French were ready for another go in August 1914. The French got Alsace and Lorraine back in 1918 and occupied the Rhineland for several years. The Germans were back in 1940 to annex the whole of northern France except "Vichy."

I read somewhere that the period from 1870 to 1945 was a prolonged European civil war to establish the role that Germany was to play in Europe.

Answer 2

The Napoleonic Wars helped to create modern Europe, but were not directly related to the future conflicts. WWI was not begun as a conflict between France and Germany. A complex system of international alliances throughout Europe sparked the conflict that grew into the Great War in 1914. Serbia and the Austro-Hungarian Empire were the original instigators of WWI, not Germany and France.

WWII had even less to do with the Napoleonic Wars. Hitler was insane and hated the French and British not because of the after affects of the Napoleonic Wars, but because of the after affects of WWI. France and Britain demanded that Germany be reduced to ruin after the Great War. The Treaty of Versailles stripped Germany of its military and destroyed the economy, plunging the nation into a severe depression with hyper-inflation. Hitler blamed France, Britain, and the Jews for Germany's downfall after WWI.

Answer 3

well actually the European powers excluding France were united in a coalition against France so in some respect it brought the European powers closer together, i would say the congress of Vienna did more to sow the seeds of future conflict than the Napoleonic wars

Answer 4

They took place while Canada and the States were fighting thr war of 1812! I really doubt it.

Answer 5

I agree, to the extent that it sowed the seeds of Franco-German hatred; however, there were a lot of other factors as well.