Blame and Criticism
July 13, 1781, Metz.
Unlike the rapidly shifting American front, the atmosphere on the French mainland front had sunk into a profound lull. It was because the siege of Metz, which had begun in May, still showed no sign of ending.
"Field Marshal! It's time to make a real decision now!"
William V was still demanding a decisive battle.
"Your Excellency, Marshal. We've lost contact with the foraging units near the steel mills. We've sent three messengers, but none have returned. It seems they were killed en route."
The rear lines were growing unstable.
"Employer. Last month's pay is overdue."
Funds were running dry.
"A dispatch from the homeland. No further support is possible given the situation back home. His Majesty the King has said, 'If you want support, show results,' demanding meaningful outcomes."
Reinforcements were nonexistent.
"We have rations left for only two weeks. Ammunition powder and musket balls are safely stored in magazines, but we've exhausted all the shells and cannon powder in the siege, so even with the guns, we can't fire them."
The anti-French coalition army, with its 700,000-strong force, had failed to capture Metz—which held only about 20,000 civilians and 6,000 soldiers—for two whole months.
"Field Marshal. Let me ask you frankly. What exactly are you afraid of?"
"Governor-General. No matter how much you scold me, I won't launch a siege assault. There's a reason outdated tactics have fallen out of use."
"That damned 'new-era' tactic of yours is the one killing us! If we just sacrificed 30,000 and stormed the walls, that might be one thing, but at this rate, all 700,000 of us will starve to death! You're not dying to French bullets—you're dying to our own flawed strategy. Why can't you see that?!"
Laudon hadn't entirely ruled out old-fashioned siege assaults over the walls. But faced with a fortress of unprecedented strength that defied all his accumulated military wisdom, he had no choice but to resort to the "starve them out" tactic.
Even traditional sieges required breaching holes in the lower walls, but with not even a scratch on the battlements so far, attempting one now might fail to take the city before suffering catastrophic losses.
"We need at least part of the wall to crumble before we can do anything. No matter how bountiful the harvest in France, their food situation has to be worse than ours."
Above all, he was a baron. He couldn't help but think beyond the immediate battle, to the war's aftermath.
"Field Marshal. Frankly speaking, isn't your assumption that Metz has little food inside just optimistic speculation?"
"No, it's not. Your Excellency has governed a state yourself, haven't you? Logically, Metz's food supplies are either on the verge of running out or already depleted."
"We're in a situation where we have to believe that! Field Marshal, I find you profoundly unreliable. If it were me, I'd have infiltrated spies at night—ladders, the Moselle River, whatever—to gauge Metz's true state. But have you done any intelligence work? Do you know their numbers, how much food is left in that fortress city, their armaments and deployments, guard strength, civilian morale? Anything at all?"
Laudon couldn't refute him. Just as William V said, he knew nothing.
Of course, Laudon hadn't been idle. It was simply that Metz's defenses were so ironclad that no spies returned with intelligence.
Spies sent via the Moselle never came back, and those disguised as refugees turned out to be double agents upon return.
"Then, do you know the situation in the Netherlands?"
But this wasn't solely Laudon's failing. The allied supreme commander might be Laudon, but each nation was responsible for its own intelligence to wage its own war. This wasn't Austria's war alone—it was a coalition of equals.
"No more long talk. If you're going to complain about intelligence, send in even one spy first."
"Of course it's not just about intelligence that I call you unreliable. Field Marshal, I harbor deep suspicions about your aversion to decisive battle. Why are you avoiding the siege?"
"Among all the commanders seated here, I am the one who most desperately wants a decisive battle. But as you all know, in our current state, we'd be annihilated before we could even begin. Once the assault starts, who will handle the deserters? The Swiss mercenaries? The Prussians? Governor-General. If we launch the siege right now, who will manage the 400,000 green Italian militia outside? The Dutch?"
Laudon pressed on with his tirade, not giving William V a chance to rebut.
"Someone might suggest dividing our 100,000 into smaller siege groups due to physical limits. But suppose we take Metz that way—what then? If we slaughter all 400,000 to capture one fortress, is that victory? Isn't it a massacre born of incompetent command? Forcing soldiers into a battle where death is certain isn't war—it's pushing them off a cliff."
"That's why we're in this mess after two months—with such defeatist thinking! Have you forgotten taking the Lorraine steel mills? France is a rotten door! Kick it, and it'll thunder but fall right off. That Louis XVI, that peace-softened childish fool, didn't bother fortifying such a key facility with walls or bastions. He's a so-called Enlightenment thinker with his head full of flowers!"
"Anything else you'd like to say?"
"Plenty! Why are we struggling at Metz? It's because of the Field Marshal's obsession with maintaining this absurdly bloated force of 700,000! Field Marshal, your incompetence has reached criminal levels! There could be talk of sieging in groups of 100,000 due to physical limits? Naturally! What reason is there to cram 700,000 into one theater to begin with?! You're talking about starving Metz, but who's starving in the end? Us! By sheer numbers, Metz has under 30,000 civilians and soldiers combined, while we exceed 700,000! If the civilians eat their home stockpiles, and like Lorraine's farmers, hoard dozens of sacks per household, we'll starve first, obviously. And then what? 'Starve them out'? Ha! It's the 'starve ourselves' tactic!"
"That's overly pessimistic speculation."
"You're the one who's overly optimistic! I can no longer trust your command. I'll launch an attack on my own if I must. I'll withdraw the supplies we brought from the warehouses. No rebuttals—I blame your incompetence."
With that, William V stormed out of the command post.
The command post fell into a chill silence after his departure.
"Then, let's discuss today's supply distribution."
Laudon moved calmly to the next item on the agenda, as if nothing had happened.
"Colonel Lucas, you have the floor. Marshal, on that matter, I have a report first."
But unlike Laudon's tone, the anti-French coalition army's state was dire.
"Two weeks ago, contact with the foraging units near the steel mills was cut off. Not delayed—completely severed. We sent three messengers; none returned. The biweekly supply convoy due today is uncertain. We have three weeks' rations left, but shells and powder are nearly gone. If the Dutch take their share, rations drop to two weeks, and shells and powder will be fully depleted."
"How much exactly?"
"Rations are mostly beans. Since mid-last month, locals haven't cooperated with foraging. We barely requisitioned this year's wheat harvest. The last dispatch from the units before contact broke said farmers had locked their granaries tight right after harvest."
"Beans... beans..."
Laudon immediately considered retreat upon hearing this. The surest way to shatter soldier morale wasn't moldy bread—it was feeding them beans. Moldy bread could be blamed on storage, trimmed, and eaten with grumbling if luck was poor. But beans? They weren't made for human consumption in the first place.
"Shell and powder stocks are about 3,000 rounds. Fifteen shots per gun, and we're done. Worse, merchants here for army contracts show signs of leaking our situation to the enemy. We've detained those heading Frenchward, but we can't trust those going home either. Merchants are scum—if they sense we're vulnerable, they'll spill everything for a few francs."
If the Dutch took their supplies as William V threatened, the already scarce food and ammunition would dwindle further. He might not take everything he brought, leaving some behind, but shortages remained shortages.
"No choice left."
Laudon made his final decision for the crumbling anti-French coalition.
"Prepare for siege assault. And issue secret orders—assemble all officers captain and above at the command post."