The lesson from Napoleon - Russell Mead, WSJ [View all]

(snip)

Napoleon got a deal at Tilsit, but it didn’t make him happy. If Mr. Trump is wise, he will heed the lessons of Napoleon’s fall. The French emperor’s relentless drive for supremacy led him into a trap. The demands he made on foreign countries were so severe, and he so frequently changed his priorities and broke old deals to strike new and better ones, that Napoleon’s opponents ultimately refused to negotiate with him anymore. After Napoleon occupied Moscow, Alexander I believed compromising with Napoleon would endanger his place on the throne. He refused to make a deal. Napoleon, unable to get the victory he craved, was forced into retreat. As the French ruler scrambled to shore up his power, countries like Prussia and Austria, which he’d defeated and forced to align with him, turned on a weakened France and helped bring Napoleon’s empire to an end.

This is the threat Mr. Trump faces as he reaches for the stars. While things are going well for him, his opponents will seethe inwardly as they hail his greatness and bend, or appear to bend, to his wishes. Nobel Peace Prize nominations will fly as thick as autumn leaves. Deferential foreign emissaries will bow and scrape. The anterooms at Mar-a-Lago will teem with obsequious CEOs. But if Mr. Trump suffers setbacks, the mood will swiftly change.

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