Liveblogging Napoleon's Russian Invasion: Borodino

On the twenty-fourth* there was a battle at the Shevardino redoubt, on the twenty-fifth not a single shot was fired on either side, on the twenty-sixth came the battle of Borodino.

Why and how was the battle offered and accepted at Shevardino and Borodino? Why was the battle of Borodino fought? Neither for the French nor for the Russians did it make the slightest sense. The most immediate result of it was and had to be--for the Russians, that we came nearer to the destruction of Moscow (which we feared more than anything in the world); and for the French, that they came nearer to the destruction of their whole army (which they also feared more than anything in the world). The result was perfectly obvious then, and yet Napoleon offered and Kutuzov accepted this battle.

If the commanders had been guided by reasonable causes, it would seem it should hace been quite clear to Napoleon that, having gone thirteen hundred miles and accepting battle with the likely chance of losing a quarter of his army, he was marching to certain destructcion; and it should have been as clear to Kutuzov that, in accepting battle and also risking the loss of a quarter of his army, he would certainly lose Moscow.

--Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace 753 (Pevear and Volokhonsky trans. 2008)
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*Read: September 5, 6 and 7. Tolstoy is using Russian oldstayle.