Abstract

The Military Reforms of the Comte de Saint-Germain, or the Bone of Contention between Foreign Role Models and National Stereotypes

The battle of Roßbach on the 5th November 1757 signified a painful experience for the French army and had been perceived by the French public as a traumatising central scene of the war. Both the military and the civilian population suffered from this traumatic experience. The French army’s considerable weaknesses, which became apparent during the war, prompted the French military leaders to eagerly search for the “culprits“ of the defeat while at the same time preparing plans for reform to improve their army. A large number of them had become acquainted with the Prussian king’s tactics before and during the war. Therefore numerous French military experts regarded the victorious Prussian army as a source of inspiration for innovations within their own troops. From this comparison with the Prussian army originated the myth of Friedrich II as general. The military experts and the French public unanimously perceived Prussia as a role model for successful warfare and considered Friedrich II as the father of modern military tactics. Consequently, military experts streamed to Potsdam, Berlin, Magdeburg and even Silesia in order to participate in enactments and maneuvers of the Prussian troops and to closely observe the glorious army’s organisation. They aimed at extrapolating the new European war hero’s recipe for success for inspiration to reform their own army. Thus, the roles reversed with the Seven Years’ War: The French army was no longer a role model for the rest of Europe as it was during the numerous wars of the Sun King. Now it was the French who were searching for role models. For this reason not everybody in France shared the enthusiasm for the Prussian army; not everybody appreciated the utilitarian motives of the visitors to Prussia. The search for foreign models offended a significant part of the French population.

This becomes especially clear when considering the discipline discourses under Saint-Germain. His reforms, which aimed at an extensive reorganisation of the whole army, were opposed at the level of discourse with arguments that predominantly referred to national stereotypes. Accordingly, criticisms of the adoption of the Prussian discipline focused solely on the aspect of physical punishment, which was regarded as highly humiliating for the French soldiers. The fierce reactions of the military and the public against Saint-Germain’s reforms show, however, that the introduction of physical punishment, allegedly à la prussienne, entailed considerable socio-political consequences which not only threatened to unsettle the state of the military at that time but also the whole foundation of the civil constitution.