BIRTH OF THE BEAR:

Poltava: The Battle that Changed the World: Three hundred years ago, Russia emerged as a major power after a clash of armies in the Ukraine. Peter the Great’s victory, Derek Wilson argues, had repercussions that last to this day. (Derek Wilson, March 2009, History Today)

This year marks the 300th anniversary of a battle fought in hilly terrain near the Ukrainian town of Poltava. In the history of warfare it does not rank as one of the outstanding examples of bravery, great generalship or brilliant tactics. The victors owed their success as much to fortune as to heroism. Daniel Defoe, on receiving the news in England, was scornful. He described the outcome as ‘an army of veterans beaten by a mob, a crowd, a mere militia; an army of the bravest fellows in the world, beaten by scoundrels’. Many of his contemporaries shared his surprise and dismay and assumed that this apparent triumph of an uncivilised eastern nation over the best fighting machine in Europe was but a flash in the pan. How wrong they were. The Battle of Poltava was one of the major turning points of modern history and we are still living with its consequences. Peter the Great’s victory over Charles XII on June 27th, 1709 signalled the end of Sweden’s long period of domination of the Baltic and, more significantly, the emergence of Russia as a major European power.

The two protagonists were remarkable men, very alike in their energy, determination and ruthlessness. Charles XII inherited the crown of Sweden in 1697 at the age of 15. He married the impetuosity of youth with the clear vision and ruthless determination of a more seasoned autocrat. He had received a strict military training and was determined to emulate the feats of his great predecessor Gustav II Vasa, known in Europe as Gustavus Adolphus (he reigned from 1611 to 1632). This Protestant hero of the Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648) had established the greatness of Sweden. He was a military genius and he too had come to the throne while still in his teens (aged 17). Gustavus Adolphus had forced European monarchs to accept this ruler of a remote northern land as an equal and had established the basis of an empire which by 1697 embraced Sweden, Finland, Lapland, Karelia, Ingria, Estonia, Livonia, as well as Western Pomerania and the port of Wismar in the western Baltic and the bishoprics of Bremen and Verden, facing the North Sea. The Baltic had, in effect, become a Swedish lake and Charles’s navy was able, very largely, to control the commercial relations of Poland, the north German states and Russia with the outside world.

Peter I became sole ruler of Russia in 1696 at the age of 23 and lost no time in setting about a far-reaching programme of reform that transformed his country by opening it up to western influences. He understood well the importance of international trade and the potential wealth to be gained from the export of flax, hemp, pitch, furs, hides and timber. The problem was that Russia was virtually land-locked. Apart from Archangel on the White Sea, closed by ice for most of the year, the country had no access to the world’s shipping lanes. Peter needed a Baltic outlet. With the aid of military and naval experts hired in Holland, England, Scotland and Prussia he created and equipped a new-style army and built a Russian navy from scratch. He was determined to challenge Swedish supremacy. All he needed was the right moment and a credible cassus belli.

The accession of a minor to the Swedish throne seemed to present the ideal opportunity for issuing a challenge.