Molding the World’s Greatest Army: Napoleon Bonaparte and STEM

When exploring Napoleon’s legacy of military success, a critical factor is often overlooked: the incorporation of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics into military policy. This paper aims to bridge the gap between these disciplines and warfare by analyzing their integration through two lenses: education and strategy. Research was conducted under the guiding question: How did the inclusion of science and its related principles (STEM) within Napoleonic society foster France’s military victories and subsequent imperial expansion? To research and answer this question, I employed various primary and secondary sources, ranging from laws, decrees, and personal letters, to journals and scholarly articles. By analyzing these sources, this scholarly paper argues that Napoleon’s military use of STEM was a critical component of France's unprecedented success in warfare.