History of Warfare Summary 4 - Napoleonic Wars 5: Waterloo and the End of the Napoleonic Wars

On June 18, 1815, Napoleon's French army clashed with the Anglo-Dutch-German allied forces led by the Duke of Wellington at Waterloo in Belgium. Napoleon attempted to break through the Allied defensive lines, but his attacks did not succeed easily. In the afternoon, Prussian forces under Blücher arrived on the battlefield, putting the French army in an even more disadvantageous position. Napoleon committed his Imperial Guard in a final effort, but they failed to breach the Allied lines, and the French army retreated. After the Battle of Waterloo, Napoleon abdicated once again and was exiled this time to the island of Saint Helena in the Atlantic Ocean. In France, Louis XVIII was restored to the throne. The major European powers convened the Congress of Vienna to reorganize the post-war order, reshaping the political map of Europe to maintain a balance of power among the nations. The Napoleonic Wars influenced the spread of the ideals of liberty and equality, and the concepts of the citizen army and nation-state, which emerged from the French Revolution, throughout Europe. At the same time, nationalism and resistance against French conquest also intensified.