American Reacts Great Northern War - Battle of Narva 1700 

You make is seem like the swedes were the favorites, they were heavily outnumbered and attacking a dug in foe. Led by an 18 year old king they were definately the underdog going in to the battle. Loved the reaction as usual!

The administrative reforms of Karl XI were so impressive that after the destruction of the Swedish army at Poltava, it took less than 6 months to train, equip, recruit new officers and mobilize a whole new army to defend Skåne from Denmark and then counterattack into Northern Germany, led by the legendary Magnus Stenbock who still stands as a statue in Helsingborg where he crushed the danish army.

It's pretty funny that Rehnskiöld never gets any credit, despite being the actual military brain behind the early Swedish victories. When his king wanted to attack Narva he was the guy who drew up the plan and disposed the troops and coordinated the attack, He would do the same at Dvina and Klizow although increasingly the king grew into personal command.

To the skies...see Carolus rise!!!!

"The Russian army, as ineffective as it was large" 300 years later and that still holds true.

8:09 That is wrong. Scania (Skåne) was signed over to Sweden in the peace treaty with Denmark in 1658, during the rule of Karl X Gustav. The Scanian War in the 1670's was about Denmark trying to take it back, but failing to do so.

Dragoons are mounted infantry basically, trained to use both swords and firearms while on horseback.

Livonia was wealthy because of the ancient inland trade route to Byzantium from Riga (called the Dvina-Dnieper navigation route) founded by the Vikings.

The weather played an important role in this battle. Also part of the reason why the King of Sweden confiscated so much land from the nobility in Livonia was the Allotment System, where soldiers were given land in return for military service. The Swedish nobility were not as strong as other countries, and this kind of thing had already happened in mainland Sweden. It was different from feudalism because the soldiers didnt actually own the land but I think the state did. The soldiers would farm the land in peacetime.

Dive in folks!

Oh cool, finally a video I like to watch. Thanks for doing the history stuff again, I appriciate you (and your channel) so much. I hope you have a great day!!

I will once again accept the people's thanks!

Charles lost 667 killed and around 1,200 wounded. Russian losses were approximately 10,000 killed and 20,000 captured. Let's hope those stats will be in favor of Sweden/Finland if the old foe reappears. Sweden has been in at least 12 wars with Russia since the he 12th century. And i have heard somewhere, that 13 is an unlucky nummer... 🙏

We don't have many people in Sweden so we've always had to train our troops to be the best they can be to beat these foes who outnumbered us 3-4x.

Battle of Narva 30/11 1700 Carolus Rex age 18 ,relief army (he led himself ,was outnumbered 1:10 but succeded to attack and after a copule of hours Our Ancestors could celebrate the Victory. The Battle of Narva was a terrible defeat for the Russian army total 18000 men lost their lives on the Swedish side lost abt 700.

I love your history reactions, especially the ones regarding the northern wars(of course😉). Great video and reaction as usual👍

Finland is known as the land of a 1000 lakes. Once you leave the coast you enter the forests filled with smaller lakes.

Swede here! Well, what can I say. Russias military has always sucked big time. Look at our battles against them, we have had very good kill ratios. Look at our finnish brothers in the winter war in 1939, it was 1:6, something like that. And just look at Ukraine now, it's like 1:7 at least. Conclusion, Russia is still an old backwards society, a dictatorship with a lot of corruption and a bullying culture. Their military is to centralized because of these facts and this makes their military weak. Have always been will always be. Slava Ukraine we are with you friends!

0:03 same

Oh, was expecting the new Post-Caesar Civil War video before starting this one up :D

Carolus Rex is one of the greatest underdogs of all time...you might see Sweden at this time as the great power guaranteed to win wars against their enemies, but everything was against Carolus Rex, it was pretty much his luck and his stoic nature that got him as far as he did in the war.

It was the Swedes who were heavly outnumberd and won our greatest military victory ever (Battle of Lund and Breitenfeldt is up there to).

Kings and Generals is my fave new channel... they go deeper into the actual battle tactics and stuff. I've already binged the Roman Civil War series and the Alexander the Great series. I highly recommend them.

Yes that area of Finland is called Lakeland and Finland is referred to land of thousand lakes, even tho there are something like 168k of them

The short anser to the Tzar qustion is yes. I think there is a good vid on KRAUT's youtube channel that can anser your qustion more on depth.

The HistoryMarche video on this subject seems like a good companion piece. Battle of Narva, 1700 ⚔ How did Sweden break the Russian army? ⚔ Great Nothern War HistoryMarche ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-8JG0W2o8ULs.html As for how terrifying the advancing Swedes would be, it's shown in a song called Killing Ground, specifically one line "Emerged from the gunsmoke like demons" As for your quest to learn about the 1700s, House of History's series on the topic of the Prussian side of the 7 Years War is by far the best channel on the 7 Years War in Europe. Ironically, while you're an American trying to learn more about 1700s European Wars, I'm a Brit trying to find videos on the American theatre of the 7 Years War without much success. Any suggestions?

You used a different channel before, one of those cartoon history channels which covered this war . I remember you couldn’t decide whether Charles was good, or just crazy. Leaving from the front, putting himself in front of cannons, and basically saying screw you to all his military advisors LOL. This is a much better channel though. By the way I have ADD as well, I sympathize with you. Sometimes I have extremely complicated thoughts but trying to put them in words that aren’t 30 paragraphs is a big issue for me too. Another great thing about this channel, they do historical research, and don’t just put out possibly untrustworthy information. If there are conflicting sources, they’ll say so. If they are pretty different, they will basically say this is what some say this is what others do, and these are what are agreed between the sources, and will mention different modern viewpoints. See I already took a whole bunch of paragraphs 🤷🏻‍♂️

It's not the only time in the war when Charles will decide to storm a Russian camp against superior numbers.

The video is incorrect about the scanian war, sweden niether gaind or lost territory during that war.

About the number 1700. I suspect that it is because US modern history is considered to start in 1776, so 1700 seems more resent to you than 1699.

The Russian Empire was the most conservative country in Europe. By overthrowing the Czar under Kerensky, this was a military revolt. The overthrowing of Kerensky by Lenin was a German plot, and a means for the new urban proletariat to revolt. Neither were traditional peasant revolts (which had happened before in Czarist Russia). The resulting Russian Civil War, and the Holodomor under Lenin/Trotsky/Stalin was the suppression of a peasant revolt by the cities against extreme death and poverty from WW I. Russia has never been genuinely democratic, always authoritarian. There has always been, in every traditional society, hatred of the landlord by the slaves, serfs and free farmers. This extends to hatred of all cities since the invention of civilization (cities). The Czar or Queen Elizabeth II, are only honored by tradition or religion ... and useful for the real power, the barons. Of course this results in baronial wars (King John vs barons or Czar Peter the Great vs boyars). By violence, not by free will, the Russian Empire became the Soviet Union, on the top of millions of corpses ... flipping completely from sacred kingship and state church to dictatorship by Left Intelligencia and atheism.

At about 06:30 you ask: Was there always a hatred of the Russian tzars even before the communist rule in Russia? The answer is no. There were, over several hundred years, rivalries, enmity, war, in Europe with shifting alliances and conflicts. Land was to a considerable degree considered the property of the reigning royal house and subject to the lust of rivals. The relationship between four major countries was central, and shifting (as were borders): France, Britain, Germany, Russia. Social conditions were of importance; for one thing many people enlisted as soldiers as an occupation, bringing in an income to feed their families. A particular point perhaps explaining some of the warring was: an army was so expensive for the reigning aristocrat that he practically had to have it go to war in other countries and plunder them, in order to keep the army running for DEFENSIVE purposes. - As late as at the end of the 1st World War we see a variant of it, AND of its often unexpected consequences: the victors of the 1st WW imposing such economic hardships on the loser Germany, to pay restitution, that (a) the unfairness of that, as seen by the Germans, was a factor why Hitler came to power, and (b) the enormous war damages Germany had to pay, as far as I know propelled the development of German industry and actually undermined the economy of the recipient France - there was no incentive to work hard and develop a brisk economy. Further back: the Spanish plundering of South America, from where they brought back enormous quantities of gold, brought the price of gold down in Spain/Europe and undermined the Spanish economy. A bit later you ask why Livonia brought wealth. Well, any area of land was usually taxed. That's what masters did. They owned the land and made the subjects pay tax. That is how the masters (kings or the like with armies and other means of making their underlings obey) got wealthy.

Actually, 1699, and 1700 is in the same century. 18th century starts in 1701

Once again, a reminder... part 2 of the Congress of Vienna. Or at least, if you don't plan to watch it, please heart his comment so I know to stop harassing you about it.

27:45 - It seems to me that logistics have always been at the backbone of any military engagement. Here the Russians didn't have their logistics sorted out. They didn't have enough ammunition for the siege of Narva to start with, but instead of waiting for logistics to be sorted out, the Russians chose to push forward with their original plan. Maybe due to incompetence. Maybe due to a fear of telling the Tsar that it was a bad idea to continue. Maybe a mix. But it does sound, at least superficially, like something that is mirrored in modern times. Like, last month modern time. Russian forces moves to invade Ukraine, doesn't have their logistics sorted out, and instead of telling their Tsar (sorry, president) that it is a bad idea to continue without having logistics sorted out, they chose to push forward with their plan.

Narva.. Carolus Rex and Peter the great clashing. Karl XII such a boss as per usual. A dragoon is a kind of cavalry btw

Peasant revolts happened often in Russia. But they usually never went anywhere and were suppressed. Thanks to religious and social indoctrination, a lot of (but by far not all) Russian peasants saw the Tsar as a fatherly figure. That began to change into the late 19th century however, and was basically no longer the case by the Russian Revolution. But fundamentally, the source of the Russian Revolution was the new urban proletariat and the rank and file of the army. Both of them were the backbone of both February and October Revolutions. The peasants were a useful ally that various factions tried to win over but few saw them as the source of power itself (except the Socialist-Revolutionary Party who were agrarian socialists).

Czar Peter was just learning his trade, but he learns from his mistakes. King Charles inherited a find Swedish army, but otherwise he resembles Mark Anthony.

Hi Mc Jibbin(: a Russian soldier fight because the general told them to fight...A swed fight for his country and for the guy next to him (: that is why the sweds is stronger yes swed generals give order to but that order is long way before the attack (: USA Hockey team is damn good at the old swed war tactic in hockey...they make a plan before the match then even if they get 2 goal in there ass they "Stand on the plan" and at the end USA Winning the match (: And KARL XII was a exremely good tacticer in war hi always say that god told him.it was not order from him it was from god... Sounds very strange today ha ha ha and all sweds liked him and respected him... Russian army changed people every week on the leadership.....they don't understand why they are or what they meet (: just like todays Ukrain the Russian military dont know if they gone shoot or running home ha ha ha ha

10:00 The most efficient way to trade in those days was by boat. So controlling the ports meant controlling the trade coming out of the inland areas. Especially if the port sat on a river mouth. So if the Poles or Russians wanted to trade with western Europe via the Baltic, they would have to send at least some of it through Swedish controlled ports, meaning Sweden could tax them. Taxing foreign trade has always been a good way for kings to boost their income, since few people at home would grumble about it. This is why the monarchs of Denmark were among the wealthiest in Europe during the middle ages. They could tax all trade going in and out of the Baltic, and no one could really do anything about it.

Connar, regarding Russia prior to the ‘Bolshevik Revolution’ of 1917. As in every Feudal Agricultural Society of the time, and those ‘Industrialising’. There was historically, ‘underlying resentment’ towards the Aristocratic Elites (landowning nobles and super rich businessmen); and the ‘Kulaks’, the wealthy independent farmer in the Russian Empire. The aristocracy exploited the Kulaks; and the Kulaks, exploited the ‘peasants’ (the ‘Surfs’ paid slaves) - who did all of the work. Often on behalf of the Aristocratic Elites (landowning nobles and super rich businessmen). Prior to the Russian Revolution of 1917, in the year 1905 there was the Russian Peasants' uprising of 1905-1906. These were a series of ‘peasant uprisings’ and violence, which broke out throughout the Russian Empire, following reactionary policies enforced by Tsar Nicholas II. These ‘peasant uprisings’ culminated on the 30th October 1905, in Tsar Nicholas II issuing his October Manifesto, officially "The Manifesto on the Improvement of the State Order". A document that served as a precursor to the Russian Empire's first Constitution, which was adopted the following year in 1906. The ‘Bolshevik Revolution’ of 1917, was the ‘culmination’ of the ‘push back’ against the ancient medieval styled ‘autocratic rule’ of the Tars, in the ‘modern era’. A ‘push back’ that had been building since Karl Marx published his, ‘Communist Manifesto’ in 1848, giving purpose, direction, and a clear ‘objective’, to the oppressed masses - ‘self-governance’: - “Workers of the world unite. You have nothing to lose but your chains!” Kulak: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kulak Russian Peasants' uprising of 1905-1906: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_Peasants'_uprising_of_1905-1906 October Manifesto: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_Manifesto

Re; the Tsars. Yes and no. The majority of the Russian population were at the time peasants, and extremely religious. The Tsars were seen as ruling by divine fiat, so the peasants agreed that the Tsar har the right to rule by authoritarian monarchy. That did not mean that everything the Tsars did was seen as good, but it did mean that up until the revolutions and even during and after, the vast majority of the peasants thought the Tsar was the rightful ruler.

Peter the Great wanted to modernize Russia with a modern army and a navy. Before him the contact between Russia and the rest of Europe was limited. Russia still had problems and didn't get along with things like human rights. Serfdom was abolished in 1861 and even after that most of the countryside was extremely poor. Russia was more in the European after Peter the Great but at the end of the 1800:s, it was obvious that the Russian tzardom was gonna fall.

Strange that the speaker talks about Denmark. Denmark didnt exsist as a country on its own. The country was Denmark-Norway because Norway got under the danish king back in the 13th century when the kalmar union was founded. Actually one of the great danish-norwegian war heros in the great nothern war >Tordenskjold< or Peter Wessel wich was his formel name, was born in Christiania (Today Oslo the capital for Norway). So to seperat the country Denmark-Norway as the speaker does, doesnt make any sense. Denmark and Norway was seperated in 1814 when the Danish king lost Norway in a forced peace agreement after Denmark-Norway had supported Napoleon until his defeat.

Russia has still not learned, the w(oops) special operation in Ukraine fail of the same reasons, bad logistic and lack of competent leaders and lack of training.

Sweden was a superpower. Not anymore

Kings and Generals: The Russians are well dug in, in a city, and outnumber their opponents 4 to one. The Swedes show up after a forced march under a boy king with no support. You: It's not really fair; the Russians never really had a chance to begin with. I jest but real life doesn't have plot armour.