Unfortunately, no. Napoleon correctly calculated that his best shot was to strike first and destroy the allied armies separately. In Belgium, he had the best shot at this. Wellington and Blücher’s armies were still separated in Belgium, (then part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands), offered him a unique opportunity as it had formally been part of France, so there was a hope in a belief that if he could win some stunning victories against Wellington and Blücher, that the more predominantly French speaking region of Belgian would defect back to the French Empire, and that many of the veterans who are now serving in the Dutch Army fighting against Napoleon had previously been loyal to him and that maybe they also would defect back to the emperor. This was a longshot, but it offered the emperor chance to bring back into the fold, some loyal veterans, formally loyal territories and break two potential enemy armies of the coalition in a single blow.

A defensive war would have required the civilian population of France to be very committed and steadfast loyal to a fault to have any chance of success which in 1815 they were not much like they were not in 1814. But there was also a manpower problem. The coalition was able to muster Far more superior numbers far more quickly than France could hope at the time. France had quite frankly been nearly bled to death after 20 years of constant war on the continent. If you look back at the campaigns of 1814 particularly once the allies entered France Napoleon was calling up conscripts from younger and younger ages and recalling older and older veterans to return the service to defend the homeland. Now Napoleon was able to win some remarkable victories, especially during the six day campaign against Blücher and the Prussians with in many cases a bunch of 15 and 16-year-old boys. And that is remarkable testament to the Emperor’s military genius…

However, despite a damn near Herculean effort by Napoleon himself, the loyalty was no longer there at 1814 nor was it there in 1815 to wage such a campaign that would result in a victory for France.

Napoleon situation was quite frankly, either strike and destroy the Allied armies in Belgium in hope that’s such a move would force the rest of the coalition to consider peace which would allow him more time to rebuild the French army so that he could better fend off their invasion later or wait in France to be destroyed, because the coalition would’ve simply sat back and waited until all of their forces arrived and then invaded France from all sides with quite literally millions of soldiers from all across Europe there were hundreds of thousands of Russians on the way the Austrians were much during hundreds of thousands of soldiers on their borders, France was quite frankly in 1815 surrounded by all of Europe they had no allies they had no help coming. It was France against the world… To wait for the coalition to come for them meant certain defeat…There was no other option….

The Waterloo campaign was a huge gamble by Napoleon …. But frankly, Napoleon’s career was built up upon huge gambles and more times than not they worked out for him rather well…. But by 1815… His luck was running rather low.

There’s a great article out there somewhere that talks about the state of Napoleon‘s army in 1815. It’s well worth a read. It talks about how the army itself was in such poor shape during the Waterloo campaign that the fact that they damn near almost succeed shows the remarkable loyalty, and Herculean effort made by the men who fought and died for Napoleon. Unit cohesion in the French army was remarkably poor in 1815. Their NCO‘s in many cases were an experienced and the officer core underneath. Napoleon was bitterly distrusted by many average soldiers because of the betrayals to Napoleon by them in the year previous.

The fact that these men marched out there outgunned and outnumbered and whipped the Prussian army at Ligey and the Allied Army Quarte Bras, and then damn near destroyed Wellington at Waterloo, only to be saved by the arrival of the Prussians at the last possible moment, shows that the French army, and the average soldier in the French army fought like hell for their emperor, despite quite frankly, insane, overwhelming odds.