Mssrs.,
I too would welcome a Peninsular Campaign game, but I sincerely doubt that the system's emphasis on recreating battles can ever effectively model the fact that the French were defeated in the Peninsula, first and foremost, by the continuous, unrelenting efforts of a Spanish "Nation in Arms".
The siege of Gerona, for instance, cost the French 20,000 casualties, while Wellington's greatest victory, Salamanca, inflicted only 13,000 casualties. During the last 4 years of the Peninsular War, the French lost on average 100 men a day solely from sickness and guerilla raids, a total of 164,000 men! Equally important, despite their many defeats the Spanish regular forces continued to regroup and return to the field creating a threat that the French could not ignore. "Consequently, a colossal percentage of the French army was rendered unavailable for operations against Wellington because innumerable Spanish contingents kept materialising all over the country. In 1810, for example, when Massena invaded Portugal, the Imperial forces in the peninsula totalled a massive 325,000 men, but only about a quarter of these could be spared for the offensive - the rest were required to contain the Spanish insurgents and regulars." Gates, David, <u>The Spanish Ulcer</u>, p. 34.
The issue is not how to give Wellington his "day", but how to give the heroic Spanish nation <font color="red"><b>its</b></font id="red"> due.
Regards,
Paco
<i>Maréchal</i> M. Francisco Palomo
<i>Prince d'Essling, Grande Duc d'Abrantes et
Comte de Marseille
Commandant - Division de Cavalerie de la Vieille Garde </i>
