Bullet Point #4 – Why did Napoleon go to conquer Egypt?

Author(s) : LENTZ Thierry
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Each “Bullet Point” will confront a question related to the First Empire. My remarks are designed to form the basis for debate and, I hope, research.

(Thierry Lentz, February 2018, English translation by Rebecca Young)

Bullet Point #4 – Why did Napoleon go to conquer Egypt?
Baron Antoine-Jean Gros, The Battle of the Pyramids, 21 July 1798

Those seeking to justify Bonaparte’s Egyptian Campaign have often reached for expressions such as the “lure of the East” and a “dream of oriental grandeur”. It was, supposedly, with Alexander the Great in mind that Napoleon proposed the Egyptian operation to the “Directoire”. There is no doubt that he was imbued (as was his whole era) with the culture of antiquity and its great men. It was part of a general trend of his time, including a European passion for the land of the Pharaohs and its legends. This was the beginning of 18th-century “Egyptomania”, as expressed, for example, by Freemasonry’s search for ancient roots in the mysteries of Egypt, by attempts at deciphering hieroglyphics, and the popular vogue for decorative sphinxes and obelisks. Be that as it may, even though Bonaparte was a man of the 18th century and thus susceptible to attractions of ancient and oriental civilizations, to say that he “succumbed” to a “dream” is going too far. His interest in “the Orient” was only incidental and certainly not decisive in his proposal to undertake the expedition of 1798.

Likewise, the desire of the government of the day to get rid of a dangerous general by sending him away to fight cannot be considered as a motivation for the campaign. Admittedly some of the Directors were not sad to see him leave, but it is hard to imagine that the Executive would run the risk of sacrificing such a large fleet and army simply in order to achieve this end. A dagger, poison or the guillotine would have produced the same result, without the need to put the national interest at risk.

Against this “orientalist” backdrop, the root causes of the expedition must be sought in a more noble “geopolitical” strategy. The project to invade Egypt had been around for some time and had already cropped up several times as part of French plans for the domination of the Mediterranean and the desire to challenge British India. Indeed, these objectives were those included in the instructions issued to Bonaparte by the Directors. This ‘Egyptian plan’ had been mentioned several times since the beginning of the Revolution. Talleyrand, on becoming Minister of Foreign Affairs in July 1797, immediately approached the government on the subject. A month later, Bonaparte (with whom Talleyrand was secretly corresponding) wrote to the Directors: “The time is coming when we will feel that if we really want to destroy England, we will have to take Egypt”. The Minister’s strategic vision married perfectly with the wishes of an ambitious General who wanted to direct his career away from the viper’s nest” of Paris. After having decided that the project to invade England, to which he had been assigned, was unrealistic, Bonaparte sent his conclusions to the government, who finally accepted the Egyptian project, though not without debate.

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