Betrayal

“Sir, the British have destroyed our Naval forces. We have lost the  battle. More importantly, we have lost Egypt.”, a commander told him. Of  course, he knew this was going to happen. He did try to evade it at his  best, but British had a strong Navy. He tried to tell this to the  Directory, but they weren’t one to listen.

“We must do something else they will wipe us off existence. Check the  maps, where shall we go for safety? They won’t let us go back the way  we came.”, he asked. The alternatives would demand a war, but he had to  do what was needed of him. He had to make it back, and the troops were  already decimated.

“We can go to Acre, in Syria.”, the commander replied.

“Perfect! They’d surrender within 2 weeks, we can overthrow the  Ottomans there and the British wouldn’t capture us there so easily.  Their rule over India would be easily threatened, which they wouldn’t  want to lose. To Acre we go!”, he commanded.

“But sir, we can’t really invade the Holy Land with our meagre strength of numbers, can we?”, the commander asked.

“We must. After that, we shall go on and capture Jerusalem, and soon return to our homes. The alternative is to die out here itself.”, he said.

And so they went to Acre where the ruler refused to surrender and  held ground for much over a month, also much infuriated by what he had  done to their fellow countrymen in Jaffa before coming there. They  fought fiercely and defeated him, where he lost quarter of his army in  the bloodshed, and another quarter was wounded. The enemies had too much armies to be defeated, and his siege was laid to dust. Now all he could do was to wait there for his death.

Even after winning over so many battles, he had utterly lost. They  could kill him whenever they’d prefer. And there, his motherland was  inviting him. But he couldn’t leave his faithful army here, could he? He  cold of course make out an alternative plan, even with his strength of  6500-7000 soldiers, of which 33% were wounded and only about 4500 could  fight.

But his motherland was in chaos, and he had to make a choice.

And so, in Summer 1799, Napoleon Bonaparte abandoned his army in  Egypt and returned to France, organising a coup d’etat and becoming the  first Consul and later, the Emperor.

Alternative link: https://jatinnagpal.thisistap.com/2018/06/28/betrayal/