Toussaint l'ouverture's greatest strengths were that he was an educated (mostly self-taught) man and that he was a great strategist and delegator. He was able to appoint men like Cristophe and Breda who were very able generals. He was also lucky that his rebellion occurred at the right time - during the French revolution when ideas about liberty, fraternity and equality were being formulated. He used these ideas to show France that unless ALL men are free, not just the free-born, then equality is just another form of tyranny.
He cleverly used Spanish / French rivalries on the island to his own ends, and was able to unite the maroons with the slave, mixed-race and some free black population of the island against the French. Cunningly he used the British - in nearby Jamaica against the French, although this did not stop a Royal Naval blockade of all the