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PoDs of the Thirty Years War: Part XVI

The thing about Lützen is it really genuinely does seem like one of those battles where anything could have happened.

*Remembers @David Flin is a member of this forum*

Anything apart from ending up in a Dance off, a rap battle, victory determined by cards, the sudden appearance of the muppets, Gustavus and Wallenstein locking eyes across the battlefield and kicking off an extremely steamy romance in the smoke, WWIII...

Well, unless Frosty the Landsknecht is involved I suppose.
 
Alex Richards said:
Gustavus and Wallenstein locking eyes across the battlefield and kicking off an extremely steamy romance in the smoke
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Having once stumbled upon the fascinating Tumblr niche of people who write pornography about historical pairings,* I'm going to tell you that there would be an audience for this story.


I do wonder what would happen to Gustavus's reputation if the Swedes had really, unarguably lost the battle. Part of the romance of Gustavus is that he got a General Wolfe style send-off- died in a moment of victory. How would he be remembered if he was the young King who committed Sweden to a war against much larger neighbors, won some early victories and then got him and thousands of his men killed by Wallenstein?



* For some reason, in the ten minutes I spent reading the site in the gap between 'I've drunk enough to think this is hilarious' and 'oh god, I haven't drunk enough to keep reading,' I noted that there were many people who appeared to stan Henry VII.
 
SenatorChickpea said:
I do wonder what would happen to Gustavus's reputation if the Swedes had really, unarguably lost the battle. Part of the romance of Gustavus is that he got a General Wolfe style send-off- died in a moment of victory. How would he be remembered if he was the young King who committed Sweden to a war against much larger neighbors, won some early victories and then got him and thousands of his men killed by Wallenstein?
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Frankly, at Lützen at least Wallenstein showed far superior generalship.

Gusvatus would still have the earlier conflicts of his reign of course- arguably the distinction might be less 'oh I guess Gustavus wasn't that good' and more 'oh wow Wallenstein was amazing'- potentially going down in history as the Wellington to Gustavus's Napoleon if that makes sense.
 
Alex Richards said:
Frankly, at Lützen at least Wallenstein showed far superior generalship.

Gusvatus would still have the earlier conflicts of his reign of course- arguably the distinction might be less 'oh I guess Gustavus wasn't that good' and more 'oh wow Wallenstein was amazing'- potentially going down in history as the Wellington to Gustavus's Napoleon if that makes sense.
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I suppose the issue with that interpretation of Wallenstein becoming the mainstream historiographical view is that, unless you somehow avert the Imperial efforts to kill him (which is hard but admittedly not impossible) the narrative of life is probably going to be dominated by the view that it's a prime example of the tragedy of hubris. Or, I guess, you could have him more successfully bring the army behind him and then survive an assassination attempt and maybe revolt, maybe go over to the other side... Wallenstein gone rogue is one of those things I'd love to see someone else write, but just have no idea how you'd tackle.
 
Cevolian said:
I suppose the issue with that interpretation of Wallenstein becoming the mainstream historiographical view is that, unless you somehow avert the Imperial efforts to kill him (which is hard but admittedly not impossible) the narrative of life is probably going to be dominated by the view that it's a prime example of the tragedy of hubris. Or, I guess, you could have him more successfully bring the army behind him and then survive an assassination attempt and maybe revolt, maybe go over to the other side... Wallenstein gone rogue is one of those things I'd love to see someone else write, but just have no idea how you'd tackle.
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I was going to wait till next article to drop this one on everyone, but Oxenstierna actually offered Wallenstein the Crown of Bohemia in 1633.
 
Alex Richards said:
I was going to wait till next article to drop this one on everyone, but Oxenstierna actually offered Wallenstein the Crown of Bohemia in 1633.
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Hmm that is very interesting. I suppose the problem is, what effect would this actually have? IOTL Wallenstein utterly failed to bring “his” army round to personal loyalty, so maybe he could give the Swedes his strategic genius, but I’m not sure that this would guarantee Sweden a meaningfully stronger position. After all, we can hardly say that Wallenstein was essential to the imperial victory when they continued to do perfectly well after his death.
 
Cevolian said:
Hmm that is very interesting. I suppose the problem is, what effect would this actually have? IOTL Wallenstein utterly failed to bring “his” army round to personal loyalty, so maybe he could give the Swedes his strategic genius, but I’m not sure that this would guarantee Sweden a meaningfully stronger position. After all, we can hardly say that Wallenstein was essential to the imperial victory when they continued to do perfectly well after his death.
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True indeed, though theoretically 'Wallenstein survives the assassination attempt, defects and ends up post-war with some bit of the Empire as a Swedish fief' seems plausible.
 
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