This month marks the 204th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo, a battle which is often described as changing the future of European history. It was Napoleon's last battle, a crushing defeat, but also, to use Wellington's own words 'A near run thing'. (He even said 'I don't think it would have done if I had not been there!). More recently though, historians have started to question Waterloo, and its significance. Charles Esdaile, for example has described Waterloo as 'A Glorious Irrelevance' as a battle with the same kind of impact would have happened at some point anyway. So why does Waterloo matter?
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Waterloo was a full-stop. It permitted Britain to stand on the field and defeat Napoleon with their allies. Without that, you would have had as Napoleon claimed still in St Helena that the British were poor soldiers lead by poor generals. As shown in my book, "Becke Waterloo Logistics," Napoleon did not have an army that could have defeated the Allies. His logistics again were so poor and his misunderstanding of the fortitude of the Prussians. In 1813-14, they had been defeated and always come back again the next day. It is clearly shown that Grouchy could never have arrived on the battlefield of Waterloo in time.