Talk:Polish–Swedish War (1600–1611)

Old talk

How was this a Swedish victory when Poland annaxed more territory

No one says that this war was a Swedish victory.
This article should be rewritten in a more neutral language. The constant praise of Polish military successes in ornate language is annoying:
Chodkiewicz, despite inadequate supplies and little support from the Commonwealth Sejm (parliament) and King Sigismund III Vasa, brilliantly distinguished himself, capturing fortress after fortress and repulsing the duke of Södermanland ...
... often winning against superior odds, like at Weissenstein where he had only 2300 men and defeated a 6,000 man Swedish force; Chodkiewicz wrote in his memoirs this was a decisive battle and one of his greatest victories, with Polish-Lithuanian losses 81 dead, 100 wounded and Swedish losses approaching half of their army ...
... the Swedes were repeatedly defeated again and again in the open field. First the Poles attacked Swedish cavalry, after which they usually attacked demoralised Swedish infantry which was unable to retreat at all, and usually annihilated whole formations of this infantry.
The Swedish formations broke completely, the King himself fleeing, barely escaping back to his flotilla off the coast. Thus Chodkiewicz with barely 4000 hussars defeated a Swedish army of 8,000 infantry and 2,000 cavalry; for which feat he received letters of congratulation from the pope, all the Catholic potentates of Europe, and even from the sultan of Turkey and the shah of Persia.

Wikipedia should not be the place for hagiographic appraisal of history. --87.123.124.58 (talk) 15:18, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

What he said. Reading the text of this makes one think the Commonwealth could have depopulated Sweden by just winning field battles. If that were true, they would never have had to shift most of the military to the North from Moldova, and they would not have had to settle for a truce, and a rather unfavorable one considering the weight differences. Nowhere does it mention how crucial sieges were. Nowhere does it talk about how the Commonwealth levies and militia were discredited by their defeats, et cetera. While the Commonwealth deserves praise for its' field victories, this is too much.75.36.164.4 (talk) 23:09, 27 October 2014 (UTC)

Result

This war was a Polish defensive war (Sweden was an invader, Poland defended its territory). Considering that Poland didn't lost any territories during that war (which was the aim of Swedish invasion forces), I think we can agree that this war can be called a Polish victory.

Peter558 (talk) 01:07, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Peter558, this war (1600-1611) was more complicated than that. It followed the War against Sigismund just earlier. Sigismund demanded the Swedish crown and Charles IX then attacked Poland because he wanted the initiative before Sigismund would invade Sweden with a force. So clearly speaking, as Charles did this for "defensive aspects" this wars prior goal was not to gain any territory but to hold the forces of Sigismund not to attack Swedish main land. In Sweden it's regarded as inconclusive. I think we should better go with a status quo ante bellum or inconclusive here. Imonoz (talk) 04:21, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

I think that the outcome of the war should be inconclusive. But I disagree with the fact that Poland wanted to attack Sweden. Jürgen von Farensbach proposed the king in 1599 attack on Finland but the Polish nobles did not agree to this. In general, Polish nobles did not agree to a second trip to Sweden (nobility was busy Moldavian Magnate Wars). Without the consent of the nobles, the king could not do anything.Kcdlp (talk) 16:09, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

I haven't studied this in detail, so there's a great chance you're right here. However, this is what Charles IX believed (that an attack from Poland would soon or later appear) therefore he launched the attack on the Polish-Lithuanian so that the war would be wadged there, and desired to hold pressure. It's not unrealisticly thinking that Poland would actually later invade Sweden when the war with Moldavia to be over, if not Sweden had layed pressure on its land. Imonoz (talk) 16:52, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

The nobles did not see the interest in the war with Sweden (as opposed to the war with Moscow and Moldova). First trip to Sweden was as because Sigismund promised Poland incorporation of Estonia and nobles gave money for a trip. Sigismund III Vasa had a lot of opposition in Poland (Jan Zamoyski was the main oppositionist, after his death broke out Zebrzydowski Rebellion). Without the support of the magnates Sigismund could not start the war.Kcdlp (talk) 17:29, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

I'm talking about political aspects here, Sigismund demanded the throne whether he had support or not, Charles couldn't possible see into the future, therefore, the attack. Imonoz (talk) 18:19, 14 November 2012 (UTC)