Hundreds of thousands in battle?
Jerome Bonaparte's voice wasn't loud, yet it sent a chill and fear through all the officers present.
Since the Emperor's abdication, France hadn't engaged in a battle with over a hundred thousand troops for over 30 years. During this time, France focused only on small-scale pacification and anti-guerrilla wars, where small enemy forces were defeated by deploying just a few thousand to ten thousand troops.
It can be said that both France and Europe as a whole were losing the ability for large-scale coordinated operations, with the Austrian Empire as the most notable example. After thirty years of peace and stability, even Austria couldn't defeat its own militia.
