The Battle of Borodino, with the subsequent occupation of Moscow and the flight of the French, without new battles, is one of the most instructive phenomena of history.
All historians agree that the external activity of states and peoples, in their clashes with each other, is expressed by wars; that directly, as a result of greater or lesser success of the military, increases or decreases the political power of states and peoples.
Strange as the historical descriptions of how any king or emperor, having quarreled with another emperor or king, gathered an army, fought with the enemy's army, won the victory, killed three, five, ten thousand people and as a result conquered the state and the whole people in several million; No matter why the defeat of one army, one hundredth of all the forces of the people, forced the people to submit to it - all the facts of history (as far as we know) confirm the justice of the fact that greater or lesser success of the troops of one people against the troops of another people is the reason or at least essential signs of increasing or decreasing the strength of the peoples. The army won, and the rights of the victorious people immediately increased to the detriment of the victorious. The army was defeated, and immediately the people were deprived of their rights in terms of the degree of defeat, and in the event of a complete defeat of their army they were completely subdued.
So it was (in history) from ancient times to the present time. All Napoleon's wars serve as a confirmation of this rule. The degree of defeat of Austrian troops - Austria is deprived of its rights, and the rights and forces of France increase. The victory of the French at Iena and Auersteth destroys the independent existence of Prussia.
But suddenly in 1812 the French won the victory near Moscow. Moscow was taken, and after that, without new battles, not Russia ceased to exist, and ceased to exist six hundred thousandth army, then Napoleon's France. It is impossible to stretch the facts on the rules of history, to say that the battlefield at Borodino was left to the Russians, that after Moscow there were battles that destroyed Napoleon's army - it is impossible.
After the victory of the French in Borodino, there was not a single general, but any significant battle, and the French army ceased to exist. What does this mean? If it were an example from the history of China, we could say that this phenomenon is not historical (a loophole of historians, when it does not fit their measure); if it were a short collision, in which small numbers of troops participated, we could take this phenomenon as an exception; but the event took place before the eyes of our fathers, for whom the issue of life and death of the Fatherland was resolved, and this was the greatest war of all known...
The campaign period of 1812, from the Battle of Borodino to the expulsion of the French, proved that the battle won was not only not the reason for the conquest, but even a permanent sign of the conquest; it proved that the force decisive for the fate of the peoples lies not in the conquerors, not even in the armies and battles, but in something else.
French historians, describing the position of the French army before leaving Moscow, claim that everything in the Great Army was in order, except for cavalry, artillery and carts, but there was no fodder for horses and cattle. Nothing could help this disaster, because the surrounding men burned their hay and did not give the French.
The battle won didn't bring usual results, because the men Karp and Vlas, who after the performance of the Frenchmen came to Moscow to rob the city and didn't show heroic feelings at all, and all the countless number of such men didn't take the hay to Moscow for good money, which they were offered, but burned it
Let's imagine two people who went into a fight with swords according to all the rules of fencing; fencing continued for a long time; suddenly, one of the opponents, feeling wounded - realizing that this is not a joke, but concerns his life, threw his sword and, taking the first cudgel, began to turn it. But let's imagine that the opponent, who so reasonably used the best and simplest means to achieve the goal, at the same time inspired by the legends of knighthood, would want to hide the essence of the case and insist that he won by all the rules of art with swords. One can imagine the confusion and ambiguity that would result from such a description of the fight.
The fencer, who demanded a fight according to the rules of art, were the French; his opponent, who threw his sword and raised his club, were Russians; people trying to explain everything according to the rules of fencing - historians who wrote about this event.
From the time of the Smolensk fire, a war broke out that did not fit any of the previous legends of war. The burning of towns and villages, the retreat after the battles, the blow of Borodin and again the retreat, the abandonment and fire of Moscow, the catching of looters, the capture of transports, the guerrilla war - all these were deviations from the rules.
Napoleon felt it, and from the very time when he stopped in the right position as a swordsman in Moscow and instead of the enemy's sword saw the club raised above him, he never stopped complaining to Kutuzov and Emperor Alexander that the war was fought against all the rules (as if there were some rules to kill people). Despite the complaints of the French about the non-fulfillment of the rules, despite the fact that the Russians, the highest in terms of position people seemed for some reason ashamed to fight with a club, and wanted to become in the position en quarte or en tierce 1 by all the rules, to make a skilful fall in prime 2, etc., - The club of the national war rose with all its formidable and majestic power and, without asking anybody's tastes and rules, with stupid simplicity, but with expediency, without disassembling anything, rose, sank and nailed the French until the whole invasion died.
And the good of that people, who not as the French in 1813, having dismissed the sword according to all the rules of art and having turned it over with a hilt, gracefully and politely passes it on to the generous winner, but the good of that people, who in the moment of trial, without asking what others did according to the rules in such cases, raises the first club and nails it with simplicity and ease, until his feelings of insult and revenge are replaced by contempt and pity in his soul, as long as his sense of humiliation and revenge is not replaced by contempt and pity.
1 fourth or third. - Red.
2 the first one. - Red.