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The 1810 and 1811 campaigns in Iberia were defined by an absence- Napoleon’s absence. Napoleon had won the battle of Wagram in July of 1809. This was at once a decisive defeat of the Austrian army, and the biggest land battle in European history up to that point.
Obviously, the flow of men was out of Spain, into Germany during 1809. But after the Peace of Schönbrunn is signed in October, the flow can begin in the opposite direction. Napoleon should come, plans to come. He has laid out an operation where he, with elements of the Imperial Guard, would invade Portugal with 100,000 men, and overwhelm the British defense, retaking Portugal.
And interestingly, Wellington is informing Castlereagh that the French would need 100,000 men to drive him out of Portugal by this point. So great minds are thinking alike.
And yet Napoleon did not go.
Massena is picked to lead the invasion of Portugal. French assumptions about what would happen do not pan out.
