Napoleon's Egypt: Invading The Middle East - Reenactor.ru

THE CONSTANT TRIUMPH OF REASON153officials to meet with informal envoys. French expatriate merchants actively publishedstories on developments in the Republic in French-language newspapersread by many in the Ottoman diplomatic and commercial classes. The Ottomansalso allowed French revolutionary societies in Istanbul to pamphleteer and to rallypublicly (albeit in very small numbers), as well as to display the tricolor. The Portegreeted the vehement protests of the British and the Russians over the public displayof that emblem of the Revolution with “amused toleration.”Once it became clear that the new republic would survive militarily, in1795, Selim III allowed the appointment of a French ambassador to his capital.Ironically, Bonaparte himself almost went to the Ottoman capital in that period.In the same year, 1795, he had declined a transfer to the French infantry, whichwas being sent to put down the royalist Vendée peasant revolt against the revolutionarygovernment. He viewed such internal policing duties as beneath hisstation and considered any transfer out of the artillery corps to be an insult. Hehad therefore been dismissed from the military by the Office of Public Safetyand placed briefly under arrest. He was, however, soon reinstated.In September 1795, Bonaparte was proposed for an eight-man military missionto reorganize the Ottoman artillery corps, but he had hopes for a betterposting and used his relationship with Paul Barras, who was in charge of Parissecurity, to secure one. His friend Bourrienne represented the idea of going toConstantinople as Bonaparte’s own, but the opposite appears to have been thecase. 18 In the end, that October Barras drew on Bonaparte’s talents in dispersinga crowd of royalists and dissidents in Paris who had threatened to overthrow therevolutionary government. The general became a hero. Barras cemented theirrelationship by introducing to Bonaparte his former mistress, Josephine deBeauharnais. Barras promoted the further move away from radicalism and terrorthat had begun with the overthrow and execution of Robespierre and hissupporters in summer of 1794, and helped in the establishment of the new Directorygovernment. He then secured for Bonaparte command of the Italiancampaign, in which the Corsican distinguished himself as an innovative militarythinker who put artillery to new uses. Had Bonaparte actually gone off to adviseSelim III on the use of artillery, history might have been very different.The Treaty of Campo Formio of 1797 recognized French control of part ofthe Italian coast along the Adriatic Sea, along with several of its islands. It thereforesuddenly gave the French a presence in the Balkans and made them directneighbors of the Ottomans. Despite the suspicions this move east inspired in Istanbul,in 1796–1797 the French ambassador in Istanbul, Gen. Jean-BaptisteAubert-Dubayet, was popular and proved especially helpful in supplying some