I Feel Like I Win When I Lose
On April 6, 1974, ABBA won the Eurovision Song Contest with "Waterloo." The song transformed Napoleon's last defeat into a metaphor for surrender.
It's paradoxical. But perhaps it was exactly right. In surrender, ABBA found a vision for a Europe that had found union in defeat.
Before he met his destiny, Napoleon developed his own vision of European unity.
Napoleon's Continental System envisioned a Europe unified through its insulation from British trade. But for Napoleon, the System was always an exercise in command and control.
In his Berlin Decree of November 21, 1806, Napoleon declared Britain under a state of blockade. All commerce with Britain was prohibited. All British goods were to be seized.
The System would unite Europe through the force of that command. It was a vision of a Europe bound by imperial will, through a decree “[f]rom our Imperial Camp at Berlin.”
In two more decrees, issued November 23 and December 17, 1807, the Emperor expanded the regime into a system inspections, confiscations, and certificates of origin.
The last decree the Emperor handed to his foreign minister, with instructions to carry it to the Netherlands, Spain, and Denmark, so these nominal sovereigns could execute it as written.
Napoleon was defeated at Waterloo. His System had been defeated long before that.
At Tilsit in July 1807, Napoleon secured the consent of his Russian counterpart, Alexander, to a blockade on Britain. But unlike the little princes, Alexander did not take commands from Napoleon.
Russian public participation in Napoleon’s System was more oblique. No term on British trade entered the Russian treaty. Under its terms, Russia agreed to mediate a peace between France and Britain, 8 G. Martens 2d 640, but its only reference to commerce was Russia’s commerce with France and its clients, which it restored. Id. at 642.
Not even the separate, secret treaty of alliance commit Russia to the System. It only committed Russia to make war on Britain if Britain rejected Russian mediation, or declined to make peace on French terms. 13 F. Martens 323. In that case, Russia would be obliged to close its ports to British trade. Id. at 324. Not otherwise.
Tilsit reflects the illusions of its moment. Napoleon had seen only what he wanted to in Alexander. As Albert Sorel observed, Tilist left behind no formal engagements, no plans, only “inclinations, allusions, of which only the memories would remain.” 7 Sorel 179. Perhaps not even that.
Russia would come in on its own terms.
In August 1807, the month after Tilsit, the Emperor of All Russias issued his own decree. Russia had been troubled by foreigners, it said, and he was going to do something about it. Starting on January 1, 1808, foreigners would barred from entering the Empire, and all from exiting it, without a passport from the Russian foreign ministry. 8 G. Martens 2d 687.
This was how Russia would support the System. Not through union with Europe, but separation from it. Not through surrender to another European empire, but resistance to the whole world. In the voice of its Tsar, Russia would assert sovereignty and dominion.
To the Russian people, the decree presented another face. Their Emperor had decided to order an exacting surveillance of his subjects. They would not lose their freedoms under law, the decree assured them. They could leave if they wanted. They just couldn’t leave without his permission. Id. at 688.
In the secret Treaty of Tilsit, France and Russia had undertaken to make war on Denmark, Sweden, and Portugal if they declined to make war on Britain, and close their ports to British trade. 13 F. Martens 324.
Although Denmark was not a party to the Treaty of Tilsit, nor even permitted to see it, the treaty obliged Denmark to make war on Sweden. If Sweden refused to make war on Britain, “Denmark would be constrained to make war on them.” Id.
Sweden had been Napoleon's erstwhile ally. At his direction, Sweden had declared war on Britain, but never fired a shot in anger, even as British goods made their way to Baltic ports.
Sweden's compliance had always been a fiction. But after Tilsit, as Russian troops massed on the borders of Swedish Finland, Sweden embraced its old enemy. British ships appeared in Swedish ports. British goods flowed freely.
Russia issued its demands, Sweden refused, Russia declared war, Sweden lost. Sweden ceded Finland, forever. At home, the Swedish estates deposed their king and invited Napoleon's great marshal, Jean-Baptiste Jules Bernadotte, to succeed to its throne.
Sweden had been a reactionary monarchy since the coup of 1772. Now the Swedish estates made sure it would never return to the throne. Now Charles XIII would acknowledge that his dynasty would end with his own life.
Under Sweden's Constitution of 1772, the king had ruled alone, "he and no other." § 2. His councilors had "advised, as their office requires, but not ruled." § 4. His councilors had not been responsible to the estates, but to him and him alone.
Under Bernadotte, Napoleon's marshal, things would be different. The king would no longer rule alone. Now he would rule in council. Swed. Const. of 1809 §§ 4, 7, 8.
But now, with Napoleon's friends commanding the Baltic Sea, his Continental System came apart. Alexander's Russia and Bernadotte's Sweden, turned against his grand design. Russia opened itself to British ships. Sweden had never truly closed.
In 1812, as Napoleon marched toward Moscow, Sweden and Russia turned openly against him. The Continental System gave way to war, and war to defeat. And at Waterloo, Napoleon was defeated.
Europe's princes divided the Continent between themselves. Europe's new Continental System, tacit and informal, was not a unit, but a league. It was a league against war and revolution, sealed by a congress of princes.
Europe learned something from Napoleon's fall: that command creates its own resistance, that command without consent is command without power.
After another war, Europe tried something different. On April 18, 1951, six nations signed the Treaty of Paris establishing the European Coal and Steel Community, which became the European Economic Community after 1957.
Britain stood apart. It founded its own European Free Trade Association, Sweden included, even as it watched the Community grow stronger. It applied to join the European Economic Community in 1961. It was vetoed by France's President de Gaulle, suspicious of Britain's entry into its Continental compact. In 1967, it applied again, and was vetoed again.
Only with de Gaulle's resignation in 1969 could Britain finally enter the Community, as it did in 1973. But the question remained: How much sovereignty could a state surrender before independence became servitude? How much autonomy could it yield before victory became defeat?
And then came ABBA, making Waterloo into a love song. Not about Napoleon's defeat or Britain's victory, but about the sweetness of surrender. About finding freedom in yielding. About how losing yourself to another might be its own kind of triumph.
The genius isn't in the irony but in the constitutional truth: Modern Europe has always been about learning to love what defeats you. About finding victory in defeat. About making defeat and victory the same thing.
That's what "Waterloo" caught, as did Eurovision, itself an exercise in competitive unity, division serving union. Europe heard itself in the paradox: nationalism performing its own dissolution, Waterloo celebrating surrender, sovereignty and submission becoming one.
That's the trick Europe learned. The only trick it needed. The surrender that saves you.
In 1975, Britain would face its first Brexit referendum. It was a kind of Waterloo for Britain's beleaguered Brexiteers. Europe won. Britain was defeated; Europe won the war.
And they promised to love them forever more.
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