War and Peace

he Battle of Borodinó, with the occupation of Moscow that followed it
and the flight of the French without further conflicts, is one of the
most instructive phenomena in history.

All historians agree that the external activity of states and nations
in their conflicts with one another is expressed in wars, and that as a
direct result of greater or less success in war the political strength
of states and nations increases or decreases.

Strange as may be the historical account of how some king or emperor,
having quarreled with another, collects an army, fights his enemy’s
army, gains a victory by killing three, five, or ten thousand men, and
subjugates a kingdom and an entire nation of several millions, all
the facts of history (as far as we know it) confirm the truth of the
statement that the greater or lesser success of one army against another
is the cause, or at least an essential indication, of an increase or
decrease in the strength of the nation—even though it is unintelligible
why the defeat of an army—a hundredth part of a nation—should oblige
that whole nation to submit. An army gains a victory, and at once the
rights of the conquering nation have increased to the detriment of the
defeated. An army has suffered defeat, and at once a people loses its
rights in proportion to the severity of the reverse, and if its army
suffers a complete defeat the nation is quite subjugated.

So according to history it has been found from the most ancient times,
and so it is to our own day. All Napoleon’s wars serve to confirm this
rule. In proportion to the defeat of the Austrian army Austria loses
its rights, and the rights and the strength of France increase. The
victories of the French at Jena and Auerstädt destroy the independent
existence of Prussia.

But then, in 1812, the French gain a victory near Moscow. Moscow is
taken and after that, with no further battles, it is not Russia that
ceases to exist, but the French army of six hundred thousand, and
then Napoleonic France itself. To strain the facts to fit the rules of
history: to say that the field of battle at Borodinó remained in the
hands of the Russians, or that after Moscow there were other battles
that destroyed Napoleon’s army, is impossible.

After the French victory at Borodinó there was no general engagement nor
any that were at all serious, yet the French army ceased to exist. What
does this mean? If it were an example taken from the history of China,
we might say that it was not an historic phenomenon (which is the
historians’ usual expedient when anything does not fit their standards);
if the matter concerned some brief conflict in which only a small number
of troops took part, we might treat it as an exception; but this event
occurred before our fathers’ eyes, and for them it was a question of the
life or death of their fatherland, and it happened in the greatest of
all known wars.

The period of the campaign of 1812 from the battle of Borodinó to the
expulsion of the French proved that the winning of a battle does not
produce a conquest and is not even an invariable indication of conquest;
it proved that the force which decides the fate of peoples lies not in
the conquerors, nor even in armies and battles, but in something else.

The French historians, describing the condition of the French army
before it left Moscow, affirm that all was in order in the Grand Army,
except the cavalry, the artillery, and the transport—there was no forage
for the horses or the cattle. That was a misfortune no one could remedy,
for the peasants of the district burned their hay rather than let the
French have it.

The victory gained did not bring the usual results because the peasants
Karp and Vlas (who after the French had evacuated Moscow drove in their
carts to pillage the town, and in general personally failed to manifest
any heroic feelings), and the whole innumerable multitude of such
peasants, did not bring their hay to Moscow for the high price offered
them, but burned it instead.

Let us imagine two men who have come out to fight a duel with rapiers
according to all the rules of the art of fencing. The fencing has
gone on for some time; suddenly one of the combatants, feeling himself
wounded and understanding that the matter is no joke but concerns his
life, throws down his rapier, and seizing the first cudgel that comes to
hand begins to brandish it. Then let us imagine that the combatant who
so sensibly employed the best and simplest means to attain his end was
at the same time influenced by traditions of chivalry and, desiring to
conceal the facts of the case, insisted that he had gained his victory
with the rapier according to all the rules of art. One can imagine what
confusion and obscurity would result from such an account of the duel.

The fencer who demanded a contest according to the rules of fencing was
the French army; his opponent who threw away the rapier and snatched up
the cudgel was the Russian people; those who try to explain the matter
according to the rules of fencing are the historians who have described
the event.

After the burning of Smolénsk a war began which did not follow any
previous traditions of war. The burning of towns and villages, the
retreats after battles, the blow dealt at Borodinó and the renewed
retreat, the burning of Moscow, the capture of marauders, the seizure of
transports, and the guerrilla war were all departures from the rules.

Napoleon felt this, and from the time he took up the correct fencing
attitude in Moscow and instead of his opponent’s rapier saw a cudgel
raised above his head, he did not cease to complain to Kutúzov and to
the Emperor Alexander that the war was being carried on contrary to all
the rules—as if there were any rules for killing people. In spite of the
complaints of the French as to the nonobservance of the rules, in
spite of the fact that to some highly placed Russians it seemed rather
disgraceful to fight with a cudgel and they wanted to assume a pose en
quarte or en tierce according to all the rules, and to make an adroit
thrust en prime, and so on—the cudgel of the people’s war was lifted
with all its menacing and majestic strength, and without consulting
anyone’s tastes or rules and regardless of anything else, it rose and
fell with stupid simplicity, but consistently, and belabored the French
till the whole invasion had perished.

And it is well for a people who do not—as the French did in 1813—salute
according to all the rules of art, and, presenting the hilt of their
rapier gracefully and politely, hand it to their magnanimous conqueror,
but at the moment of trial, without asking what rules others have
adopted in similar cases, simply and easily pick up the first cudgel
that comes to hand and strike with it till the feeling of resentment and
revenge in their soul yields to a feeling of contempt and compassion.