On the one hand, by sacrificing three or four millions of francs from
the French treasury, he would have been able to support his troops
without requisitions, would have maintained good order and discipline in
his armies, and by the distribution of this money among a people poor
and interested, he would have made many partisans. He could then have
offered them, with a firm and just hand, the olive or the sword. But
then the drafts upon the French treasury, had the war been a protracted
one, would have been enormous for the support of an army of 200,000 men
in Spain. Moreover, the hostile and insurrectionary state of the local
authorities rendered regular and legal requisitions almost impossible;
and the want of navigable rivers, good roads, and suitable transport,
rendered problematical the possibility of moving a sufficient quantity
of stores in an insurrectionary country. Besides, no great detachments
could have been made to regulate the administration of the provinces, or
to pursue the insurgent corps into the fastnesses of the mountains. In
fine, by this system, he would have effected a military occupation of
Spain without its subjugation.

On the other hand, by marching rapidly against all organized masses,
living from day to day upon the local resources of the country, as he
had done in Italy, sparing his reserves for the occupation and
pacification of the conquered provinces; this mode promised more prompt
and decisive results than the other. Napoleon, therefore, determined to
adopt it for his active masses, employing the system of magazines and
regular requisitions so far as practicable. In favorable parts of the
country, Soult and Souchet, with smaller armies, succeeded in obtaining
in this way regular supplies for a considerable length of time, but the
others lived mainly by forced requisitions levied as necessity required.
This sometimes gave place to great excesses, but these were principally
the faults of subordinate officers who tolerated them, rather than of