Switzerland is presented as the book’s exemplary case of a free people maintaining political independence through its own military organization. It stands in sharp contrast to states that entrust war to mercenaries or foreign auxiliaries: where military power belongs to the community itself, arms reinforce freedom rather than placing the state at the mercy of commanders, hired companies, or allied powers.

Identity and Political Character

Switzerland is grouped with Rome and Sparta as a polity that remained both armed and free for a long period. The comparison makes the Swiss case more than a military anecdote. It establishes a political principle: a community that bears responsibility for its own defense is harder to compel into obedience than one whose security depends on forces raised and controlled elsewhere. Switzerland is therefore associated with the conjunction of liberty, civic participation, and military self-reliance.

The book’s broader account of political order helps explain why this example matters. Cities and states contain opposed social forces, especially the people’s desire not to be oppressed and the nobles’ desire to dominate them. A durable political structure must preserve public security while preventing either faction from turning authority into private oppression. Switzerland’s status as both armed and free supplies a practical image of that balance: collective force can protect political independence when it is not monopolized by a foreign captain or detached military class.

Own Arms and Freedom

The Swiss example supports the argument that princes and republics achieve their greatest success when they depend on their own arms. Mercenary troops are unreliable because their captains pursue their own advancement, while auxiliary troops are even more dangerous because they arrive already united and remain under the authority of their own officers. A ruler may therefore win a battle with foreign assistance while losing the political independence that the victory was supposed to secure. Switzerland represents the opposite arrangement, in which military capacity is rooted in the polity itself.

This relationship between arms and freedom is also institutional. A republic that trusts its own forces is more difficult to reduce to obedience than one that relies on foreign troops and places them under a single citizen or commander. Switzerland is identified as the best-armed and freest people in the world, making it the book’s most concentrated illustration of the claim that national military organization is a foundation of political autonomy rather than merely an instrument of war.

Military Reputation and Tactical Limits

The book does not treat Swiss military power as invulnerable. Swiss infantry is described as formidable, but capable of giving way before infantry that is equally resolute in close combat. This limitation is set beside the weaknesses of Spanish infantry, which cannot withstand cavalry. The resulting comparison is tactical as well as political: the strength of a military system depends on the kind of force brought against it, and no celebrated army is secure against a disciplined opponent trained to exploit its particular weakness.

The Battle of Ravenna is used as an indication of how Swiss-style discipline might be challenged. Spanish infantry confronted German companies described as operating under the same discipline as the Swiss. By using agility and bucklers, the Spaniards forced their way beneath the pikes and reached a position in which the Germans could no longer defend themselves effectively. Cavalry intervention prevented a complete rout, but the episode is presented as evidence that infantry trained on a different system could withstand, and potentially defeat, forces modeled on the Swiss method.

Contrast with Foreign and Mixed Forces

Switzerland’s significance becomes sharper in contrast with France’s military course. Charles VII strengthened France by establishing national ordinances regulating both men-at-arms and foot soldiers. His successor, Louis XI, abolished the national infantry and began hiring Swiss mercenaries. Later rulers continued this policy, increasing the reputation of Swiss troops while weakening France’s own infantry. French men-at-arms became dependent on cooperation with the Swiss and came to believe that they could not succeed without them.

The result was a mixed army, partly national and partly mercenary. Such a force was considered superior to purely mercenary or purely auxiliary troops, yet inferior to a wholly national army. The French example thus reverses the Swiss model: Swiss military excellence, when imported as hired service, did not reproduce Swiss political freedom or create equivalent national strength. Instead, dependence on foreign infantry diminished France’s capacity to act independently.

The same contrast appears in the example of Cesare Borgia. He first entered Romagna with French auxiliary men-at-arms and captured Imola and Forlì. Finding foreign troops untrustworthy, he replaced them with mercenaries, including the Orsini and Vitelli forces; discovering those troops to be fickle, false, and treacherous, he dismissed them and turned to forces of his own raising. His reputation increased as he moved away from dependence on the French and the mercenary captains and became master of his own troops. Switzerland functions as the collective counterpart to this lesson: durable authority requires control of the force on which authority rests.

Historical and Narrative Significance

Switzerland is not developed as a narrated scene with a personal plot, but as a comparative political example. It helps distinguish the character of a state from the mere reputation of its soldiers. The book repeatedly separates successful conquest from successful preservation: Alexander the Great could retain Asia because the political structure he conquered centralized authority, while other conquerors faced the enduring resistance of fragmented states. In the military argument, Switzerland similarly demonstrates that the organization of force determines whether victory strengthens or endangers political order.

The example also points toward the book’s larger appeal for national military reform. Italy’s defeats are attributed to reliance on mercenaries and to the absence of capable leaders, while the proposed remedy is an army recruited from the country itself. The Swiss are formidable, but their system is not treated as a sacred model to be copied without alteration; its weaknesses are to be studied so that a different discipline might withstand cavalry and resist infantry without fearing close combat. Switzerland therefore represents both an achievement to admire and a military system to analyze critically: freedom is secured by self-command, but effective self-command still depends on recognizing and correcting tactical defects.