Comments by "Nattygsbord" (@nattygsbord) on "Extra History" channel.

  1. Indeed. The king even had a fire fight and killed a bunch of turks when they wanted him to leave. But yet still they took the orders of not harming Charles seriously. As a Swede I wouldn't condemn them if they had killed that asshole on the spot.
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  2. The Germans created the caos in Russia, so one could say that the Germans got into Russia by their own effort.
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  3. The Swedish soil was crappy compared to the harvest to seed ratio seen in England, France and Holland. The people was poor. The population was tiny in size. And much of Swedens emergence as also had to do with mighty neigbouring countries was in a position of temporary inner weakness. And that was the case of Poland, and Russia, and Germany... and also to a smaller extent Denmark as well. So I'm rather impressed that Sweden could reach the levels of power that it gained. But what makes it so hard to see the future fate of Sweden is that Europe could have easily just have looked so differently if just Frederick the Great had died, if Napoleon failed in his project of taking over Europe. And who knows what would have happened if Poltava had become a Swedish victory? Maybe Ukraine and the Ottomans would have joined the war on Swedish side, and tsar Peter who already was extremely unpopular in Russia for his western modernisation reforms might have been executed by his own people. And what would have happened if Norway fell into Swedish hands with Charles invasion? hard to tell
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  4. Poltava got a special place in Swedish history. Its kind of our Gettysburg, Waterloo or Stalingrad so to say.
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  5. Sweden didn't lose much ground in this war and didn't really lose its status as a great power. But many of our ancestors died at Poltava. Mine served with Upplands regiment and they all died there.
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  6. The thing is that Sweden would not have to crush the Russian army completly. Just as the Russian army in world war1 was still huge when a rebellion and a civil war broke out. And had Russia lost all will to fight, then the war would be over.
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  7. I think this discussion already have become too far-fetched and urealistic. Napoleon happened because of the French revolution, and the French revolution happened because of France's shitty economy, and France shitty economy happened because of war debts it gained by the Seven years war. And Prussia, Austria, and Russia could solve their debt problems by improving their economy's by stealing Polish land. And with Sweden into the Seven years war things would have been very different (if it would ever happened at all). - There would be no participation of Poland since Charles had turned it into a vassal puppet state, and Sweden would have refused to share it with other countries. - And Frederick the Great's kingdom was only saved from destruction from the new Russian monarch, Peter III of Russia, who was a huge fanboy of Frederick the Great and made an immidieate peace treaty with him, and even planned to let Russian troops side with Prussia in the Seven years war. And if Russia never existed. Then this event would never have happened either. And had France won the Seven years war against Prussia and England, then would have never been any loss of North America and huge war debts, which means that the French revolution would never have happened, and therefore there would not be any Napoleon Bonaparte as the ruler of France, and much less the ruler of Europe.
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  8. Peter the Great himself told some Swedish POWs that he at first tought that he had lost the battle of Poltava after the Swedish attack had made his men fleeing the field. And the battle could have ended with a Swedish victory there and then if just the Swedish cavalry had pursued the fleeing men and if the Swedish infantry had pressed on. But instead the infantry was ordered to break off the attack and the cavalry was no where to be seen. And time was lost, and then the Russians launched a huge counterattack that crushed the Swedes. So no, the Swedish army was not yet beaten when it arrived at Poltava. Things could very well have ended differently.
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  9. Charles had 3 armies - the army in Finland, the corps of Courland, and his majesties own army. And the finnish army was supposed to push into Russia near st Petersburg, but the army was led by a coward so it just turned around instead of tieing up Russia forces from other fronts. The army of Courland got confused what direction to take, so it got isolated and outnumbered by Russian forces and took heavy losses. And Charles was a bit unwise about his campaign about Russia, but he nevertheless he almost won. He intended to go northwards, but paniced when the Russians had burned all food so he made the irrational decision to go to Ukraine. He also decided to move his army fast instead of just wasting a single day of waiting for the Courland corps to link up with him, which in turn caused unnecessary losses of Swedish men as the corps was too small to fight on its own. And at Poltava there was this conflict between Rehnskiöld (the commander over the cavalry) and Lewenhaupt (the commander over the infantry). Where Rehnskiöld behaved like an asshole and bullied Lewenhaupt before the battle. But the day after the siege of Poltava turned into a battle after orders from King Charles. And Swedish forces moved forward and came into disseray because the infantry was moving too fast, in 2 hours before schedule. And therefore attacked the Russian without much support, so the losses piled up. But the infantry nevertheless crushed the Russian on the rightwing so they started to flee. And Peter the Great afterwards said that he considered the battle to be lost at this point, and he started to prepare his retreat. And despite all blunders Sweden had done under this battle and before it, it seemed like the Swedish Army was about to win again. All that had to be done was to pursue the fleeing enemy with all horsemen and foorsolidiers the Swedes had and throw them into the fleeing Russians. But then the unthinkable happened. Rehnskiölds horsemen was nowhere to be seen. And when Löwenhaupt got his new orders he couldn't believe his own eyes, as he was now ordered to halt his attack now when victory seemed certain. And all this because a small portion of the Swedish infantry on the left was tied up on the left flank togheter with Rehnskiöld's horsemen in a totally unimportant fight in nowhere. So the Russians got some rest and grabbed the oppurtionity to launch a might counterattack that crushed the scattered Swedish forces. And King Charles had foolishly never moved his artillery to the battlefield only because he thought it would be unnessary, because in none of his previous battles had artillery played any important role. But in this battle it could have played the difference between victory and defeat. Since the Russians had extremely much artillery at the disposal that caused huge losses on the Swedish army. And the Swedish artillery could have done the same if it had been deployed, and it could have played a key role in the last Swedish massassult that failed if it could have softening up the enemy resistance. All in all, one could say that the Swedes came very close to defeating Peter the Great despite all blunders and all suffering during the winter. And had the Swedes won the battle, one could have seen many interesting events coming to take place.... maybe the Turks would feel like joining the war against Russia, maybe the Cossacks and Ukrainians would finally join forces against Russia, and maybe the Russian people would rebel against Peter Great for all bloodshed he brought upon his own country. And many Russians also hated Peter because of his many unpopular western reforms, so if the Swedish army had weaken Peter, then many Russians could have seized the oppurtunity to rebel.
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  10. How much money did this guy have? castles, wars, buying the crown of Poland, having party fucking drinking like crazy and even creating an anti-temperance organization togheter with Friedrich Vilhelm of Prussia. Seems like this guy had an endless number of expensive hobbies, so where did this guy get all his money from?
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  11. The army of the 30 years war consisted much of mercenaries. But the armies of the great Northern war consisted mostly of Swedes and a smaller number of finns.
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  12. vi borde återuppprätta banden till vår östra rikshalva, och vår västra också för den delen. var ju trots allt vikingarna som upptäckte usa först
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  13. Dom får väl också vara med i klubben om dom vill :)
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  14. Sweden was already pacifist when Peter the Great declared war. Not so much because of idealism, as because of realism. The country had been fighting wars almost non-stop for over a hundred years. So the country needed a paus. It had conquered enough land and needed to consolidate all its conquests. Sweden had no offensive military plans in their mind at this point. It rather hoped to stay out of any war. And this was also one of the last advices Charles father gave his son the last day before he died. Sweden was in a terrible dilemma. It was too weak to fight Russia, Denmark, and Saxony-Poland all at once on its own. And joining a military alliance, with say France would of course solve that problem, but it would also create another one - Sweden would be drawn into many pointless wars on behalf on warmongering France. Which was not in Swedens best interest. The country just wished to be left alone and not getting involved in another war the next hundred years or so.
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  15. He was 2.06m with his boots on. And he never took his boots off.
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  16. Hitler wanted Russias resources and wrote nasty things about the slavic people in his book Mein Kampf, and basicly saw the huge Russian land as a good way to build a new German colonial empire as large as the British empite that covered fifth of the globe. Russias growing industry and aggressive behaviour towards countries in the baltic, Finland and Romania made Hitler fear a war with Russia might coming soon. So by invading Russia in 1941, Hitler thought that he would be able to knock out Russia before they had become too powerful. And Russia also seemed weak in 1941, Stalin was a suspicious man who had killed hundreds of Marshals, Generals and other skilled commanders because he saw them as a threat to himself. So in 1940 his army lacked good leadership when Russia attacked Finland, which was the poorest country in Europe. But despite having a large army and the most modern and powerful tanks in the world Russia lost the war totally. That in turn made Hitler confident that he could invade Russia and easily make it fall apart, when the Russian army couldn't even defeat the finns. Hitler had the best army in the world in 1941, the soliders had been in combat many times before and gained experience. Confidence in the leadership was high and fighting morale among the troops was strong, training and tactics had been improved after experiences in the fighting in Europe, equipment had been tested in real combat and that which performed bad was scraped and the germans tried to produce more of the good weapons that proved effective.
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  17. He was a buddy with Friedrich Vilhelm (the dad of Frederick the Great). And they used to party and drink beer togheter and eat cakes made with 600 eggs while many gun batteries were firing, and August also liked to fuck around with young brides and he fathered hundreds of kids or so.
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  18. He was a very kind, unselfish and generous King who even liked to let the guesting team win at his own hometurf.
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  19. To me it seems like Sweden would have many enemies both inside and outside it borders if it managed to take Denmark-Norway, and keep its land Finland, Germany and the Baltics. And even with this impressive amount square kilometres of territory, the country would still be completly underpowered in terms of manpower and money in the game of international politics. The Swedish empire had 2,500.000 inhabitants while Denmark Norway had about 1,500.000... so its just 4.000.000 people in total that the Swedish empire would have. As a comparison did France have a population of 21 million. Russia 15 million. Turkey 25 million. Holy Roman Empire had 15 million. England 9 million. And Spain 55 million. So if a bunch of mighty countries had band up they could have easily torn the apart the Great Scandinavian Empire. Germany and Russia would certainly been happy to see this threat to them dismantled. And many sea powers would also like to see Swedens monopoly power over the Baltic trade route broken. Sweden could of course have allied themselves with France, but I guess even that couldn't save the Scandinavian empire in the long run.
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  20. German states such as Brandenburg would feel more threatened than ever and turn to Austria and the holy Roman empire for its defence for its independence. Remember, Brandenburg and Saxony joined Austria against Sweden during the 30 years war. And both of them also fought against Sweden later on. And Russia had enormous manpower resources at its disposal. What was most striking to me when I read this book: https://ospreypublishing.com/russian-army-of-the-seven-years-war-1-pb Was that Russia was at war almost every year during the 1700s, and lost 100.000 - 200.000 men for each yearly military campaign they participated in... they could one year lose 50.000 men against Sweden, another year lose 200.000 men against the Ottomans, and then they could fight the Prussians and lose a hundred thousand more. So the question is, could Sweden keep on losing men like the Russians did time and time again? And the answer is of course not. And no, I don't consider the Ottomans as an ally. And France was an ally, but one shouldn't forget either that it was Napoleon that made us lose Finland to the Russians. So I can definatly see that Russia and Germany would gang up against Sweden, and the country being drawn into war with more powers as well if we ally ourselves with France. It would basicly just being another world war just like the Thirty years war, the war of successions, Seven years war, the American war of liberation and Napoleon wars etc.
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  21. I'm confused when did all of this swap to the seven years war?" The Seven years war is only interesting so far as it led to a chain of events that ended up in Napoleon. "Mercenaries was a big part of war so the population isn't everything" Mercenaries cost money, and richer more populated countries could certainly afford more troops than Sweden could. "Sweden had an influx of german and dutch immigrants" 2000 wallons immigrated to Sweden over a 60 year period.........I wouldn't call that immigration important when it is compared to the large populations of France and the Holy Roman empire. " if Sweden would have remained strong odds are that Prussia would not have risen to the power they did" Even if not, they would still have a large, well diciplined and extremely well drilled army. And all German states would probably joined up behind the Holy Roman empire in case of a war broke out. Austria would support Prussia and vice verse. "according to me for Sweden to have remained a great power of europe they would have to bene extremely lucky and almost all plans had to go according to plan" I think Sweden could have become a great power (in the real sense of the word) in the short run. And one could argue that it could have ended up as the most powerful country in the world under Gustavus Adolfhus. But I also think that Sweden was fighting against the clock. Sweden was great power for only 200 years from mid 1500 to mid 1700, and much of the Swedish expansionism during this time period was possible thanks to inner weaknesses of our neighbouring empires, Russia, Poland and Germany had their peoples fighting each other.. and was became an easy prey for our superior military. Likewise was Denmark a bit unstable for this time period. Sweden was also for a short period of time blessed with great leaders and organizers - Gustav Vasa, Gustavus Adolphus, Charles XII, Charles XI and Charles IX. But this luck would eventually run out, like it did for other countries. And Swedens scarce resources wouldn't allow us fuck up once. While Russia easily could lose an army and two.
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  22. Sweden was forced into this war, and the king didn't wanna sacrifice any land that his ancestors had fought to gain. And it is easy to be clever in hindsight. But could Sweden really had been better off with another King? I don't think so. Had Sweden just sacrificed some land, our neighbours would just had taken, more, and more, and moar. So Charles did the only thing there was to do: Fight. And he was a brave man who always fought in the front alongside his own men and inspired them. And his bravery and boldness helped the Swedish army to be more victorious than what a normal monarch would. Of course he could have made peace with Russia in 1708, when Peter almost wanted to give up the war and offered peace in exchange for only keeping his conquest of St. Petersburg. But Charles refused. And why would he accept such an offer? The Russians had lost every battle since the start of the war. And why should he not get back what others had stolen from him? One last victory was all what was needed. Then a rebellion would get rid of the unpopular Tsar, and Sweden could have gotten peace on favourable terms.
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  23. If we only just settled in America before everyone else then we might perhaps had a chance..... But Sweden was too cold for a large population back then, and it couldn't use its huge natural resources in Northern Sweden until the 1870s when the first railroads were being built so tonnes of timber, charcoal and iron ore and steel could be transported at a cheap cost. Around year 1800 did Norway actully export 4times more timber than Sweden despite Sweden got 4 times more forrest land than Norway. And this was because it was too costly to transport heavy timber and other heavy goods to make it profitable enough for creating new industries. England had no ice that covered their waterways half the year, and they plenty of people that could pay for a canal construction project - while Sweden was ice cold and had a tiny population that was quite poor. So Swedens great export boom had to wait until the railroads were invented, and until scientists had invented a new process that made it possible to use phosphor rich iron ore, that Sweden had in Kiruna, but couldn't use. And Finland had to wait even longer to become a rich industrial nation, because of the same reasons, since most of its timber laid far away from the coastline and couldn't be sold to other countries without better transportations. So it didn't matter that Finland almost had as much forrest as Sweden. And using waterpower to cut timber was more of a problem in cold Northern countries, and this problem remained until the steamsaw and electricity powered saws got invented, and people could use lightbulbs to work in the dark winter nights. Findland was still the poorest country in Europe during the 1930s. So Sweden was a poor agricultural society during the 1600's and 1700's, and there was not much else than that and exporting iron, copper and trying to control the baltic trade routs. We never was any big player in trading tobacco, slaves, silver, chinaware, tea, cotton, silk, spices, sugar or textiles and other manufacturing products. Sweden was only good at two things back then. Farming and fighting wars & making guns.
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  24. Basicly all countries in Europe was developing countries by standards of today, which means that all of them relied on agriculture rahter than producing finished manufacturing goods. And Sweden was the weakest among the major powers in Europe at this time, and its population the poorest. And the cold climate had much to do with this. And transporting things was only possible in the summer months, since Swedens climate wasn't the same as in France or England. And regards to world trade, so was iron one of the most important exports Sweden had. During the Age of Liberty (1718-1772) it brought in 80% of Swedens export revenues, since Sweden togheter with Russia basicly had a monopoly on the market when the two countries togheter produced 95% of all iron in Europe. Timber was however an unimportant export, since it was too heavy and therefore too costly to transport by land, And the huge timber reserves in Northern Sweden couldn't be used because of the frozen climate didn't allow it to be transported or cut by a watermill saw. And in the days before electricity and lightbulb it was not practical to work during the dark winter hours. But when new technologies - such as the railroad, steamsaws - solved the problems by enabling cheap transports and massproduction of cut timber during winter, then Sweden could start to become a rich industrial country. And in the 1870s did timber generate 80% of Swedens export incomes.
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  25. The Great Northern war was a defensive war, and that was the reason why Sweden went to war with Saxony and Russia. And at the time when Charles XII took power in Sweden, the country was already too exhausted for further military expansion so there was really no plans for any more expansionist projects. And don't take my words for it, because this is what histiorian Bengt Liljegren writes in his biography of Charles XII. The 1600s had been a time of military glory for Sweden with huge territorial gains. But the price had been terrible. For a hundred years there had basicly been no investments done into the agriculture because of the high war taxes that sucked up every surplus resource. And many historians claim that the horrific wave of starvations that hit the empire was caused by this lack of investments into the agriculture, which left the country totally unprepared to deal with crises like this. And third of Finlands population just starved to death in 1696 alone. So I am skeptical to the idea of further expansion for the Swedes. Especially since England and Holland would intervene with their navies against Sweden for the sake of balance of power. And even if Sweden had managed to take Norway, I think Sweden would have a hard time competing with other great powers, such as for example Prussia and Russia - which were both superior to Sweden in size of the population, the size of their economies and the size of their armies.
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  26. He was the last king in Europe to actully lead his own men by charging head-on togheter with them
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  27. Immature rulers was the normal in the old days when people died young. And one could say its still the normal among the leaders of today. I would say that Charles was one of the better kings Sweden had. He was certainly above average. While Queen Kristina, Johan III and Gustav IV Adolf were kind of shitty monarchs. Who were deeply religious, wasteful with money, and weak assed idiots who rather pleased the nobility than serving the interest of the nation. Kristina not only gave back war booty to our enemies without anything in return, but she even sold off sacred Swedish historical documents and treasures for a price below their real value. And the Swedish taxpayers had to spend enourmous amounts of money to buy them back because of her high treason. Had she been alive today I would have wanted to she her executed for high treason.
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  28. From what I understand did the Swedish part of the Swedish army compose of 18000 infantry and 8000 horsemen, while the Finnish part of the Swedish army was made up of 7 infantry regiments of 7000 men and 3 cavalry regiments with 3000 men each, plus an extra squadron of dragoons of 313 men. "I egentliga Sverige bestod de indelta förbanden av femton infanteriregementen (inklusive Jämtlands dragonregemente), sju kavalleriregementen, ett kavallerikompani och en dragonskvadron. Allt som allt 18 000 man infanteri och 8 000 beridna soldater. I Finland bestod indelningsverket av sju infanteriregementen (7 000 man), tre kavalleriregementen (3 000 man) och en dragonskvadron (313 man)" http://www.tacitus.nu/karoliner/armeer/sverige/organisation.htm For more exact numbers per regiment. http://www.tacitus.nu/karoliner/armeer/sverige/index.htm
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  29. Petersburg is the city that made Russia into a great power. It was Russias port to the west for exporting fur, timber and iron without having to let its trade go through Swedish hands. And the city also became kind of a capital for Tsarist Russia.
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  30. Under the video it says: ♪ Get the outro music here! http://bit.ly/23isQfx *Music by Sean and Dean Kiner: http://bit.ly/1WdBhnm
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  31. Agreed. The should take a sabre and a horse and lead the charge
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  32. No really. According to the Lisbon treaty, Sweden is obliged to defend other EU countries if they are under attack.
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  33. The Swedish king should have made peace while Sweden was winning. There was simply no chance Sweden could win this war in the long run. Sweden was a poor country with a small population, while Saxony had lots of money and Russia hand endless manpower reserves... just look at the staggering losses the Russian army took during the 1700s and you will be horrified with all hundreds of thousands of men they were losing year after year when fighting against the Turks, Prussians, Swedes and others. Sweden could never afford such losses, because Sweden was never a real Great Power of Europe in the real sense of the word. Sweden had never played ball with the mightiest countries of Europe after the days of Gustavus Adolphus, because Sweden lacked the population and money to build armies of a hundred thousand men like Russia, France and Austria. Saxony, Poland, Russia And Denmark combined had a population 40 times larger than the huge Swedish empire, so there was simply very little hope that Sweden could end this war by crushing all her enemies.
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  34. How can you be so sure that it will end the same way this time around?
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  35. The Danish army consumed 25 tonnes of hairpowder per year back in the days. And the Swedes were probably not any worse. http://pennanochsvardet.se/militarhistoria/militara-artiklar/1700-talet/krigsman-eller-modelejon
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  36. Karl is his real name. While the brits for some strange reason calls him charles.
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  37. Most likely a Norwegian solidier. But some conspiracy theories says it was some Swede. Possibly someone with ties to king Fredrik who took the throne after he Charles died.
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  38. He could just have turned his head to the side when things happened, or the bullet could have bounced. Who knows? Personally I don't think he got murdered.
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  39. Karl är en av de största kungarna i Svensk historia och den bäst kända kungen i svensk historia. I alla fall här i Sverige. Tyvärr har det blivit kontroversiellt att prata om honom. Svenska nationalister höjer honom till skyarna som en hjälte konung, medans en del vänsterfolk kallar honom för en galning som älskar krig och sket i sitt eget folks lidande. Att han var som en Hitler eller en Pol Pot. Men naturligtvis var han inte något av det där. Han byggde inga utrotningsläger och han krigade för att han inte hade något annat val. Invasionen av Norge är väl ett undantag. Han befann sig också tillsammans med sina soldater i stridens hetta. Han var en krigarkung. Men man kan inte beskylla honom för alla krig, då det var Danmark, Sachsen-Polen och Ryssland som angrep Sverige... och senare anföll också Preussen och Hannover. Sverige fick mobilisera varenda sista reserv av manskap och pengar för att överleva, och vi lyckades ha tur att vinna många slag. Så landet klarade sig. Han startade ett anfallskrig mot Norge. Men det är ju knappast något unikt med anfallskrig på den här tiden. Det var något vanligt bland Europas kungar på den här tiden, och Danmark-Norge låg länge i luven med Sverige. Så i fall man en gång för alla krossade den Danska arvsfienden så skulle det underlätta för Sveriges ställning som stormakt. 1718 hade många år av krigande gjort att många svenskar var trötta på krigande. Många soldater hade dött och mycket pengar hade fått tas ut i skatter. Och många män hade fått vara borta i från sina hem i åratal för att vara ute och kriga. Så kanske var det då en svensk som sköt Karl. Men det kan också ha varit en Norsk kula. Eller så kan det ha varit en politisk konspiratör, som ville ha en ny kung på Sveriges tron. Hur som helst tycker jag att det är synd att många svenskar skriker "nazism!". För de svenska soldaternas kamp förjänar att minnas. Hela landet deltog i försvaret av fosterlandet. Och våra soldater förtjänar att hedras. Men i landet Sverige så görs inte mycket sånt just. Vilket jag tycker är synd. Jag tycker att man kunde göra några filmer om hans krig i stil med patrioten, och ge ut någon skiva med svensk militärmusik från stormaktstiden, då det finns gott om svenska marscher med hög kvalité av Bellman och andra. Svensk historia är inte bara vår egen historia, utan också hela nordens, så kanske vore det intressant även för andra länder att veta lite mer om svensk historia.
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  40. Well, they attacked the Swedes with mounted knights in the battle of Warzaw
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  41. Its hard for me as a Swede to tell too. He was a good motivator of his men, and he organized money and logistics superbly for Swedens invasion of Norway. And he had won every battle he had fought until he lost the battle of Poltava in 1709. But it is hard to tell how much had to do with his own skill. His enemies sometimes made a few mistakes. And sometimes he was lucky and his army was tactically superior and very well drilled. So was it because of him, or was it because of his army that he won? Anyhow, he should have tried to end this war as soon as possible instead of playing around in Poland for years. Sweden never had any real chance of winning a war against an alliance consisting of countries with 40 times larger population, and Russias endless resources and Saxony was one of the richest countries in Europe. The Swedish king was just a boy when he took throne, and he was a bit immature and a religious fundamentalist. And wasteful with money according to Voltaire. A wiser king would probably just had tried to make a status quo peace soon after the victory at Narva.
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  42. Friedrich II, is frederick the great charlemagne is karl der grosse (karl den store)
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  43. What about the allies troops that walked into Germany?
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  44. According to most mainstream history books, so was Sweden a great power. But I consider such a statement only to be a half truth since the might of the Swedish empire was simply not comparable to the might of France, Spain, the Ottoman empire or Austria. But on the other hand there was no doubt that Sweden was a regional superpower in Northern Europe. And Russia, Poland and Germany feared the Swedish army more than anything else. Sweden held the control of the baltic sea in a firm grip. And the Swedish king Gustavus Adolphus changed history when he joined the protestant side in the 30- years war, and saved the reformation from getting destroyed by the Spaniards who was trying to take over the world.
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  45. One day we will make a clone and come back...
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  46. He nearly succeded with that. And if he had taken Norway, history could have taken a very different direction... with Sweden seen as a strong ally for other great powers.
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  47. The problem is that you could not just turn around and go back the same way as you come from, since you already have plundered all food that there is to eat in the villages you have visited. Any army during the 1600s and 1700s would have great problems of finding food. And since Eastern Europe was poor and the farmers didn't have the same large harvests as farmers in Holland or Germany, so the armies had therefore to move faster on the Eastern front in order to avoid starving to death since place after place more quickly ran out of food. In the Netherlands it was no problem for a 100.000 men strong army to sit at the same place for weeks. But the Swedish army in Poland had to be constantly on the move, because after one village had run out of food, there was no other option than moving to the next village to get something to eat. So there was a reason why the Swedish army was the most mobile in Europe during the 1600s and 1700s. And there was reasons why armies didn't move much in Holland when the harvest to seed ratio was 20:1, compared to 10:1 in Germany, and only 5:1 in Poland.
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  48. England and the Netherlands are the exception and not the rule among European powers when it comes to warfare during the age of muskets. They were rich countries that rather put their money to their navies, while their armies were small and unimpressive compared to other great powers such as France, Austria and Russia. And since their armies was small and the countries was rich, they then could rely more upon their own supplies instead of looting. Sweden was however a poor country with a small population and could not win wars dragged on for years. Denmark, Poland, Saxony and Russia had 40 times larger population than Sweden, so the only hope to win was to make a blitzkrieg and fast knock them out one by one. And usally this tactic had served Sweden well, and the country even became one of the most powerful countries in Europe during the 30 years war. Sweden couldn't substain its own armies, so the solution was to let someone else (the civilian population in enemy lands) pay for the upkeep and provide it with food. All looting and french subsidies allowed Sweden to build an army of over 100,000 men during the 30 years war - which is not bad for a country of just 1,5 million inhabitants to have an army of the same size as France and Austria with populations 15-20 times larger, And having supplies transported into Eastern Europe is not a simple task- just ask the Germans and the French about that matter. This was in the age before canned food, trucks and railroad transports so transporting anything at all was a hard task back in this age, and the only good way of doing it was by riverboats if there was no ice outside.
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  49. The enemies of Sweden had a 40 times larger population
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  50. All countries had grenadiers in their armies. They were the heavy infantry, and it consisted of the best men in the army. And the Swedish solidiers of the 1700s are usally called caroleans after king Karl XII. They carried their yellow-blue uniforms and used their own distinct tactics of this time. In movies like "the Patriot" or "Barry Lyndon" you will see solidiers in the 1700s walking in line formation and fire salvo after salvo upon the enemy... But Swedish tactics were very different. Our troops held their fire until the enemy only was about 25 meters away, and then they all fired, and directly after they fired they attacked the enemy with bayonets, pikes and swords. And this was because Sweden couldn't afford losing any manpower in long firing duels with the enemy. The Danish army prefered to fire and exchange shots with their enemy for hours, while the Swedish army was extremely offensive and prefered attacks with cold steel more than any army in Europe. The Swedish army was also an army that prefered to fight the battles inside enemy countries, rather than trying to go on the defensive and fight the enemy inside Swedish territory instead. And the reason was simple - Sweden was a poor country with little manpower so it could not afford a long war, and especially not so if its own towns would be burned to the ground. So it was better to take the fight to the enemy and steal his money and letting his farmland feed the Swedish army, instead of giving Swedish farmers and taxpayers the burden of supplying the Swedish army. And if Sweden could win its wars fastly with superior troop quality, tactics and good commanders... then limited resources would not be so much of a problem. So it was no coincidence that Sweden had the most mobile army in Europe in the early 1700s. And many military speed records was set during the Polish campaign, when the Swedish army quickly ran out of food on the poor polish farmland and therefore had to constantly move on towards another village to get food.
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