France Overseas - Great War and Climax of French Imperial Expansion

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CHRISTOPHER M. ANDREW and A.S. KANYA-FORSTNER

France Overseas The Great War and the Climax of French Imperial Expansion

THAMES AND HUDSON

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Any cop,· of this book issued by the publisher as a paperback is sold subject to the condit.ion that it shall not by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated, without the publisher's prior consent, in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including these words being imposed on a subsequent purchaser. c. 1981 Thames and Hudson Ltd, London All rights reserved. �o pan of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted i.n any_ form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recordmg. or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Printed and bound in the United States of America

Contents Preface One France and the Pre-War Empire Two

Pre-War Imperial Aims

Three War Aims: The Viviani Wartime Governments, August 1914-October 1915

7 9 33 55

Four Towards the Partition of the Enemy Empires: The Briand Government, October 1915March 1917

83

Five The Crisis of 1917: The Ribot and Painleve Cabinets, March-November 1917

116

Six Clemenceau and the Empire: November 1917-November 1918

137

Seven Peace Aims: November 1918-January 1919

164

Eight The Peace Conference: January 1919-January 1920

180

Nine The 'Sky-Blue Chamber': January 1920-May 1924

209

Ten Towards the End of Empire Sources Abbreviations Notes to the Text Map 1: The French Empire between the wars Map 2: The partition of German West Africa Map 3: The wartime partition of the Turkish Empire: the secret agreements of1915-17 Map 4: The British and French mandates in the Middle East after San Remo (1923) Index

237 255 262 263 290-91 292 293 294 295

Preface

For both France and Britain the First World War and the peace settlements which followed brought to a conclusion four hundred years of expansion overseas. This final phase of French expansion has also been the most neglected by French historians. Both the brilliant analysis of French co­ lonialism by Henri Brunschwig and the standard history of overseas expan­ sion under the Third French Republic by Jean Ganiage end in 1914. 1 The latest general survey of French imperialism by Charles-Robert Ageron passes over the war years and the peace settlement with only the briefest of men­ tions.2 Raoul Girardet's otherwise indispensable interpretation of French im­ perial ideology actually contains the remarkable assertion that 'with the founding in 1912 of the French protectorate in Morocco, the Third Republic's work of overseas expansion comes to a final conclusion'. 3 Our own book is concerned with the expansion which followed that 'final conclusion'. There is no single archive which allows even the general outline of French policy in the last years of overseas expansion to be seen as a whole. Our ac­ count has had instead to be pieced together from a diffuse variety of official and unofficial sources, some only recently available to researchers. The story that emerges is not simply the story of government policy. Historians are nowadays used to the idea that governments tend to lose control of their agents at the outposts of empire. They are less accustomed to the idea of governments losing control of imperial policy-making even in their own capitals. That, however, is substantially what happened in France. French policy during the final phase of French expansion was made in Paris. But the cabinet had little to do with it. We hope that our book also makes a modest contribution to the modern history of the Middle East. The Anglo-French rivalries which largely deter­ mined the present boundaries of many Middle-Eastern states have been seen perhaps too much from the British rather than the French side, and on the French side too much in terms of government policy. The history of the

8

Preface

famous-or infamous-Sykes-Picot accord provides a good example. Much has been written about Sykes. But Picot has come down to posterity as a curi­ ously anonymous figure, invariably identified only as a French diplomat. We have tried to show that he had another identity also. We are conscious that the gigantic historical jigsaw of imperial expansion, despite the few pieces we hope to have added to it, remains highly in­ complete. In particular, analysis of the impact of European imperialism on the extra-European societies it encountered still has very far to go. We have come to the heretical conclusion, however, that some episodes in the final phase of European expansion scarcely merit prolonged investigation. One of the by-products of that expansion was endless discussion and endless memoranda on sometimes trivial imperial issues. A classic instance is the quarter-century of confused and circular arguments over the exact status of the city of Tangier. As late as 1928, according to one of the participants, in­ tetnational negotiations in Paris on the Tangier question still 'became so acrimonious that the French chairman used to adjourn the meeting to enable a walk in the gardens of the Quai d'Orsay to cool tempers'. 4 The ar­ chives are now available in several countries for a comprehensive account of the Tangier negotiations which would fill a book several times the length of this one. It would be a book of exquisite tedium-so exquisite in fact that it may never be written. We owe too many debts to friends, colleagues, librarians and archivists to fit decently into a brief preface. Six of these debts, however, we must acknowledge: to the Wolfson Foundation and the Canada Council for help­ ing to finance the lengthy research on which this book is based, to Miquette and the late Jacques Millerand and to Marc and Timee Michel for hospitality and intellectual stimulation during frequent visits to Paris. Cambridge I Toronto December 1979

1

France and the Pre-War Empire

'There is a tradition', wrote one embittered French colonialist in 1900, 'that France gets colonies so that England may take them over.' 1 Until the mid­ eighteenth century France's imperial progress had kept pace with Britain's. But in the Seven Years War she was almost driven out oflndia and the New World by the British. Thanks to her victories over France, Britain remained a great imperial power even after the loss of the American colonies. The French, however, emerged from the Napoleonic Wars with only the tattered remnants of their imperial past: five trading posts in India, the island of Reunion in the Indian Ocean, a few footholds on the West African coast, French Guiana in South America, the sugar islands of Guadeloupe and Mar­ tinique in the West Indies, and the rocky islets of Saint Pierre et Miquelon off Newfoundland, valuable chiefly for the fishing rights which went with them. Left with only colonial trifles after Waterloo, France seemed to have lost all appetite for further imperial expansion. Over the next century, however, she was to build a second empire even larger than the first. Its construction began almost by accident. It did not occur to the sightseers who crossed the Mediterranean in pleasure boats to enjoy the spectacle of the bombardment of Algiers in July 1 830 that they were witnessing the rebirth of French im­ perialism. The soldiers who landed after the bombardment to teach the Dey of Algiers a lesson had orders to return within six weeks. Instead, they stayed behind to found a new colonial empire, concentrated this time not in India and America but in Africa. By the time France established her protectorate over Morocco in 1912, she had acquired an African empire of 10 million square kilometres, as well as an Indochinese empire of 750,000 square kilometres, Madagascar, and a string of smaller possessions in the Indian and Pacific oceans. The First World War brought with it the final phase of French imperial expansion. At the peace negotiations after victory, France extended her African empire to its furthest limits and gained a Middle­ Eastern empire for the first time.

IO

France and the Pre-War Empire

Yet the construction of the second French Empire, vast though it was, rarely aroused the enthusiasm either of French governments or of the French people. Indeed, the two nineteenth-century French statesmen most closely identified with overseas expansion, the Emperor Napoleon III and his republican opponent Jules Ferry, both aroused, in the short term, a violent reaction against it. Napoleon III insisted that 'there is an expansive urge in France which must be reckoned with'. To reckon with it he despatched one overseas expedition after another: to the Crimea, to China, to Lebanon and to Mexico. The 'expansive urge', however, afflicted not France but the Emperor himself. By the time he fell ingloriously from power in the Franco­ Prussian war, most politicians felt, like Jules Ferry, that the French people had been 'sickened' by overseas 'adventures'. During the early 1880s Ferry's republican governments embarked upon another round of overseas adven­ tures in North Africa, Madagascar and the Far East. But in 1885, after a minor military reverse in Indochina, Ferry himself was swept from office by a wave of public revulsion against colonial expansion. Georges Clemenceau, who was ironically to preside over the closing stages of French expansion a generation later, denounced the colonial policy of the Ferry government in the most venomous rhetoric of his parliamentary career: 'We are no longer willing to listen to you. We are no longer willing to discuss with you the great interests of the fatherland . . . Those who stand before me are no longer ministers; they are men accused of high treason.' 2 The colonial initiatives of Napoleon III and Jules Ferry were not, however, typical. For most of the nineteenth century the control exercised by central government over the course of French expansion was fitful and sporadic. The main expansive urge came not from Paris but from soldiers and sailors at the outposts of empire, prompted on occasion by missionaries and businessmen who had preceded them. The beginnings of French expan­ sion in North Africa during the July Monarchy were the work of Algerian generals who turned military insubordination into a fine art. During the Second Empire the Cambodian protectorate was established by an admiral who similarly disregarded the instructions of his minister. As late as the 1880s and early 1890s French marines in West Africa carved out a private empire in defiance of their orders. It seemed to some observers that the whole French Empire was a gigantic system of outdoor relief not, as in the British case, for the upper orders but for the armed services. 'What drove us to expand in far-away places', wrote the former colonial governor, de Lanessan, in 1897, 'was above all the need to find something to occupy the army and navy. '3 By about 1890, however, the main though not the only pressure for con­ tinued expansion had shifted from the periphery to the centre. What pro­ duced this shift were the passions aroused by the Scramble for Africa and the European rivalries which the scramble generated. To Jules Ferry, now in

France and the Pre-War Empire

II

retirement, it seemed that: 'An irresistible movement is leading the great nations of Europe to the conquest of new lands. It is like an immense steeplechase towards the unknown.' As places in the African sun began to fill up, an influential body of metropolitan opinion became preoccupied with the fear that those places which remained might go to foreign rivals. 'The overriding priority', it seemed to metropolitan imperialists, 'was to ar­ rive first wherever African territories were still unclaimed. '4 Politicians and pressure groups in Paris rather than colonels and proconsuls on the frontiers of empire formulated the series of grand designs which dominated the course of French expansion during the quarter-century up to the outbreak of war: the successful extension and unification of France's tropical and North­ African empires, a less successful drive for a greater Indochina, and an un­ successful attempt to force the British out of Egypt. The First World War completed the shift in the dynamics of French im­ perialism from empire to metropolis. France won her Middle-Eastern and African mandates not in the Middle East or Africa but on the Western Front. Her military presence in the Middle East was negligible. At the end of the war the French contingent in Palestine and Syria numbered only 3,000 Armenians, 3,000 Africans 'and 800 Frenchmen who had been promised that they would not have to fight'. 5 Even in West Africa, where French troops played an important part in the conquest of the German colonies, they were outnumbered by the British. That the peace settlement eventually gave most of German West Africa to France was due far more to French negotiators in London and Paris than to French soldiers in Africa. In West Africa, as in the Middle East, France's bargaining position rested chiefly on the sacrifices she had made in Europe. Without victory in Europe, the Allied conquests outside Europe would have been meaningless. Though the main imperial initiatives during the final generation of French expansion came from Paris, they did not come from the French government. French cabinets were notorious for their indifference to colonial affairs. In the quarter-century before the First World War the abdication of cabinet control over colonial policy at the centre was just as striking as the earlier failure to control the soldiers and sailors at the outposts of empire. In each of the three main imperial initiatives of those years-the Fashoda strategy of the 1890s which sought to challenge British control of Egypt, the Entente Cor­ diale of 1904 which paved the way for a Moroccan protectorate, and the Fez expedition of 19 1 1 which brought that protectorate about-the part played by the cabinet was very slight. The first unsuccessful attempt to send an ex­ pedition to Fashoda in 1893 was made without even the knowledge of the cabinet. And though the cabinet approved the departure of the Marchand expedition in 1896, it did not discuss the expedition again until it found itself two years later, after Marchand's arrival at Fashoda, on the brink of war

12.

France and the Pre-War Empire

with England. The French cabinet's part in the negotiation of the Entente Cordiale was scarcely more impressive. In England the foreign secretary sought the views of other government departments as soon as talks with France began. Throughout the negotiations the cabinet was regularly con­ sulted and its approval sought. In France, the cabinet was not briefed by the foreign minister-and then probably inadequately-until negotiations had been in progress for six months. In 191 1 the Fez expedition which was to precipitate a French protectorate in Morocco was decided by only three ministers under colonialist pressure while the rest of the cabinet was on holi­ day .6 The general absence of cabinet control over colonial policy derived, in part at least, from the constitutional weaknesses of the pre-war Third Republic: transient governments with an average life-expectancy of nine months, a poorly developed sense of cabinet responsibility, and a general preoccupation with domestic politics rather than with foreign policy. Some prime ministers were disinclined to allow their cabinets to consider foreign policy at all. Combes (whose ministry of 1902-5 was one of the longest of the Third Republic) is said to have cut short ministers who attempted to discuss foreign affairs with the remark: 'Let us leave that subject alone, gentlemen. It is the business of the President of the Republic and the foreign minister'. But cabinets were in any case infrequently tempted to concern themselves with external affairs. Few ministers before the First World War even discovered the terms of the alliance with Russia which was the cornerstone of national security. Nor, amazingly, did they seem bothered by their ig­ norance. The First World War obliged French cabinets to devote more time than usual to foreign affairs. But the pressures of the war in general and the appalling problems of the Western Front in particular left them no more time or inclination than before to consider colonial expansion. The general indifference of French cabinets to the colonies they ruled was due to something more than their own administrative deficiencies. It also reflected a widespread feeling that the Empire was of only peripheral impor­ tance to the affairs of the metropolis. To the British government the Empire was of central importance. The defence of India and the routes to it preoc­ cupied Victorian statesmen throughout their years of 'splendid isolation' from the continent of Europe. 'Our foreign policy', said Lord Rosebery in 1892, 'has become a colonial policy.' 'The great problem which this country has to face', said Balfour ten years later, 'is one of Indian rather than of home defence.' That attitude was only slowly eroded by fear of the German mastery of Europe. It was never in doubt that British troops would defend India. But it remained in doubt until 4 August 19 14 whether they would defend France. French priorities were quite different. France, unlike Britain, had a con­ tinental identity and saw her vital interests overwhelmingly in continental

France and the Pre-War Empire

terms. Not even the most passionate colonialists ever believed that any con­ quest overseas could fill the gap left by the German seizure of Alsace­ Lorraine in 1871. Their opponents in the later nineteenth century were outraged by the very idea of overseas expansion so long as the lost provinces remained in German hands. To those colonialists who argued the case for colonies as the road to national recovery, Deroulede replied: 'I have lost two sisters and you offer me twenty chamber-maids!' From the Franco-Prussian to the First World War the great strategic priority of the French general staff remained the defence of the metropolis against German invasion. The problems of imperial defence which preoc­ cupied British statesmen and service chiefs scarcely occurred to most of their counterparts in France. The Empire indeed hardly entered the calculations of the French general staff at all. Despite their anxiety at the German army's growing advantage in numbers, the high command was strangely reluctant to consider the potential contribution of the Empire to a war in Europe. And yet the idea of an African army was an old one. 'The most useful products Africa can supply to France', Napoleon III had declared, 'are soldiers.' Algerian troops had fought in the Crimean War. The tiratlleurs senegalais, whose first battalion was founded in 1857, had distinguished themselves in the Franco-Prussian War. But successive republican governments failed to build on the foundations laid by the Second Empire. Even during the decade before the First World War the vigorous campaigns conducted by Adolphe Messimy and Charles Mangin in favour of, respectively, an Algerian army of 100,000 men and an even larger force noire from tropical Africa met with indifferent success. In August 1914 there were only 30,000 tirazlleurs senegalais and 35,000 Algerians under arms. Britain, by contrast, had grown accustomed to regard India as-in Lord Salisbury's words-'an English barrack in the Oriental Seas from which we may draw any number of troops without paying for them'. During the half-century before 1914 In­ dian troops had served in more than a dozen campaigns from China to Uganda. W. E. Forster had complained as early as 1878 that the government was relying 'not upon the patriotism and spirit of our own people' but on getting 'Gurkhas and Sikhs and Mussulmen to fight for us'. Or, in the words of a music-hall parody: We don't want to fight, But, by Jingo, if we do, We won't go to the front ourselves, We'll send the mild Hindoo.

Conscription in the British Isles was not introduced until 1916. The regular army at the outbreak of war numbered only 120,000 at home and 60,000 abroad. But by August 19 14 there were already almost a quarter of a million Indians under arms. 7

France and the Pre-War Empire The same disparity in Anglo-French attitudes to empire was evident in the economic sphere. Overseas possessions were of central importance to the British economy. They were of only secondary (though by no means negligi­ ble) importance to the French. Forty-five per cent of British foreign invest­ ment before the First World War followed the flag. French investors, however, were more interested in the Russian Empire than in their own. Tsarist Russia attracted 25 per cent of French foreign investment before 1914, the whole French Empire only 9 per cent. Much of what colonial in­ vestment there was had been guided to the Empire by state contracts, con­ cessions, and guaranteed rates of interest. In Black Africa 83 per cent of pre­ war French investment was public rather than private. Private investors, both large and small, were notorious for preferring the apparent security of foreign government loans to the risks inherent in trade and industry. As du Vivier de Streel, the leader of the wartime campaign for the mise en valeur (development) of the Empire, complained: Our capitalists have always been very distrustful of colonial enterprises. The explanation lies partly in their ignorance, partly in the discouraging advice given them by the financial institutions to whom they look for guidance and who prefer to direct them towards larger investments in foreign countries.

Even the colonial banks were cautious institutions who did little before 1914 to stimulate either colonial expansion or colonial development. The philosophy of the largest of them, the Banque de l'Indochine, was summed up by its director, Stanislas Simon, in two sentences: 'We earn quite enough money. Our main preoccupation is not to lose any.' Britain was also dependent on colonial trade in a way that France was not. India in 1914 was Britain's largest export market and the mainstay of her balance of payments. Indeed the Indian market was even more important in the increasingly competitive trading conditions which Britain encountered at the turn of the twentieth century than it had been in her heyday as the workshop of the world. France's colonial trade, by contrast, was far less im­ portant to her on the eve of the First World War than it had been on the eve of the French Revolution. In 1787 30 per cent of France's external trade had been with the French West Indies alone. Moreover, French politicians and businessmen showed an awareness of the importance of colonial trade which they were to lack a century later. The reactionary Abbe Maury told the Con­ stituent Assembly in 1791: 'If you did not possess the colonial trade, the kingdom would be lost.' The regicide Barere, who agreed with Maury about little else, put the same view to the Convention: 'Without the colonies, commercial prosperity is impossible.' The loss of Santo Domingo and the virtual collapse of the lucrative West Indian trade left a commercial gap which even the vast colonial expansion of the next century failed to fill. Dur­ ing the years 1909-13 the second French Empire, despite its enormous size, accounted for only 10 per cent of France's external trade.

France and the Pre- War Empire The explanation, a spokesman for the m1mstry of commerce told a government commission in 1918, was 'quite outrageous neglect' by French business : We have spent tens of millions of francs on raw materials from abroad, when with a little energy and good will we could have obtained them from the co­ lonial domain which belongs to us. Almost 60 per cent of colonial imports were foodstuffs. The sugar industry was totally dependent for sugar-cane on colonial production . Not all co­ lonial foodstuffs, however, were welcomed by French producers. Wine im­ ports from North Africa, over 20 per cent by value of all colonial imports on the eve of war, were deeply resented by the winegrowers of the Midi. Apart from foodstuffs, in 1913 the Empire also provided significant quantities of three important raw materials: 55 per cent of French phosphate imports, 25 per cent of oilseed imports and 14 per cent of rubber imports. But these were exceptions. Cotton provides a striking example of the 'quite outrageous neglect' of which the ministry of commerce complained . At the outbreak of the First World War the French cotton industry obtained only 0. 1 per cent of its raw cotton from the colonies. Joseph Chailley-Bert, secretary-general of the Union Coloniale Franfaise, the main society of colonialist businessmen, described colonial production at the outbreak of war as 'truly wretched for such a vast colonial empire and for such a rich metropolis'. The Empire did provide significant markets for a number of French in­ dustries; in 19 13 it absorbed 68 per cent of French sugar exports, 65 per cent of soap exports, 4 1 per cent of metallurgical exports and 33 per cent of cot­ ton exports. But French industry still gave little sign of possessing an im­ perial mission or pursuing an aggressive campaign to capture new markets overseas. Chailley-Bert's comment on the French cotton industry was true of many others: 'It is geared to the metropolitan market and only when that market fails does it concern itself with the colonies. ' In the decade before the First World War France failed, more often than not, to capture even half the trade of its own Empire. Because of the weakness of her merchant navy ( only 12 per cent the size of Britain's), much of France's colonial trade was also dependent on foreign carriers. That dependence was made worse by wartime shipping losses. By 1917 half of France's imports came in British ships. Throughout the Third Republic, France's main colonial trading partner was Algeria. By the later nineteenth century trade with North Africa usually equalled or exceeded that with the rest of the Empire. In stark contrast, the huge tropical Empire acquired during the Scramble for Africa remained remarkably neglected. The enthusiasm of most British, as well as French, businessmen for the scramble was distinctly muted. In 1890 The Economist scornfully dismissed the whole affair as 'a quarrel of tenth-rate magnitude over interests of scarcely any national importance'. Even so, the response of

France and the Pre- War Empire French business to the opportunities offered by the scramble was distinctly more sluggish than that of its main competitors. The French Congo at­ tracted only a small fraction of the investment which had poured into the Congo of Leopold II . In West Africa, despite the long history of French com­ merce with Senegal (which continued to account for well over half the foreign trade of Afrique Occidentale Franyaise), French businessmen were notoriously less enterprising than their British and German rivals . At the outbreak of the First World War production of cocoa, coffee , and tropical fruits had scarcely begun in Afrique Occidentale Franfaise. In 1 9 1 3 cocoa production in the British Gold Coast already amounted to 5 1 ,000 metric tons ; in the neighbouring French Ivory Coast it was 47 tons. The indifference of French business to colonial expansion was not, of course , universal . The Lyons silk industry, the only French industry domi­ nant in the international market , provides perhaps the most frequent excep­ tion to the general rule . During the second half of the nineteenth century the devastation of French sericulture by disease forced Lyons silk magnates to look overseas for new supplies of raw silk . The Lyons chamber of commerce enthusiastically supported the conquest of Indochina . At the end of the cen­ tury it was briefly tempted by the prospect of a Scramble for China, then widely expected to follow the Scramble for Africa . During the First World War, anxiety to protect its silk supplies from the Middle East led the Lyons chamber of commerce to take an active part in the campaign for 'la Syrie in­ tegrale' . No financial institution could rival the sense of imperial mission displayed by the silk magnates of Lyons. The Paris banks did , however , display a greater interest in the penetration of Morocco than in any previous phase of French expansion . Some of their most unscrupulous pickings before the First World War were made as moneylenders to the Sultan . A confiden­ tial memorandum prepared for the Comite du Maroc in 1 905 complained: 'A powerful consortium organized at the request of the government and directed by the Banque de Pans will hand over to the Sultan only 48 million out of a loan nominally of 62 million , and even before it has provided all the capital it is already charging all the interest.' Even when French businessmen took an interest in the Empire , their in­ terest was liable to bring them into conflict with the main advocates of col ­ onial expansion inside and outside government . Most French industries with colonial outlets were anxious to preserve the Empire as a private market for themselves , protected by high tariffs from foreign competition . The co­ lonialist movement, convinced that protection was damaging colonial development , wanted , on the contrary , to lower tariff barriers and give each colony the right to fix its own customs duties . When the colonial tariffs came up for revision in 1 9 1 0 , colonialists and industrialists thus came into open conflict. All the main colonialist societies joined together in the Federation lntercoloniale to campaign for reform . The main employers' federation , the

France and the Pre- War Empire Association de l'Industrie et de /'Agriculture Franyaises, denounced the co­ lonialist campaign and sought to keep the tariffs as they were. The final stages of French colonial expansion do not fit Lenin's celebrated analysis of imperialism as 'the highest stage of capitalism'. Unlike many Leninists, Lenin himself seems to have realized this. Lenin located the main thrust of French imperialism not in the extension of the Empire but in the enormous power of French foreign investment. 'Unlike British colonial im­ perialism', he wrote, 'French imperialism might be termed usury im­ perialism'. More often than not, the interests of French 'usury imperialists' and colonialists diverged. Even in Morocco, where the interests of the two groups overlapped, the overlap resulted in conflict. Those bankers and in­ dustrialists most tempted by the exploitation of the Moroccan economy also favoured the formation of multinational consortia. The main advocates, both inside and outside government, of a Moroccan protectorate took a quite different view. Morocco-or as much of it as possible-must belong to France alone: 'We cannot share Morocco with anyone'. The secretary-general of the colonialist Comite du Maroc insisted: 'If we wish to resist Germany in Morocco, we must begin by pitilessly tightening the purse strings'. The same conflict between the internationalism of finance capital and the nationalism of the colonialist movement recurred in both the Turkish Empire and the Far East. 8 There was thus a remarkable contrast between the rapid growth and enor­ mous size of the French Empire on the one hand and the relatively slight at­ tention it evoked from both government and business on the other. The in­ difference of the general public exceeded even that of government and business. 'All that interests the French public about the Empire', Jules Ferry remarked at the 1889 Paris exhibition, 'is the belly dance.' Several times dur­ ing the next quarter of a century the colonialist movement tried to persuade itself that the Empire was about to take hold of the popular imagination. On each occasion it had to admit failure. In 19 13 the Ligue Coloniale, the main colonial propaganda organization, reluctantly confessed: 'The colonial education of the French people has, as yet, not even begun.' In Paris and the three cities chiefly concerned with colonial trade-Lyons, Marseilles, and Bordeaux-public ignorance had been slightly, though not extensively, dented. But in the rest of France apathy to the Empire appeared invincible. A review of colonialist propaganda in the main colonialist newspaper, La Depeche Coloniale, concluded in June 1914: We must have the honesty to admit that the results have been mediocre. Paris and the large cities nowadays possibly understand what a colony is , how it functions and what makes it prosperous . But go into the provinces and you will be stupefied by the ignorance on colonial affairs, not merely of the peasant and the worker, but even of people who in other respects are educated and cultivated .

18

France and the Pre-War Empire

The colonialists had only to look at England to feel humiliated by the extent of their failure to conquer French opinion : In Paris one has the feeling only of being in the capital of France. In London one has the feeling of being in the capital of the British Empire. There lies an essential difference which explains a great deal . In the immense city on the banks of the Thames, everything reminds the Londoner that he is the citizen of a World Empire . . . It would never occur to an Englishman , even of humble origins and education , to put in doubt the value of Canada , of India or of Australia to the metropolis. 9

The Bishop of london was probably right to tell Queen Victoria that the im­ perial rejoicings and sense of imperial unity shown at her Diamond Ju bilee had 'awakened the respectful wonder of all Europe' . French colonialists thereafter sometimes exaggerated both the self-confidence of British im­ perialists and the penetration of popular imperialism through all sections of the'population . Nonetheless most Englishmen probably did take a pride of some sort in 'the Empire on which the sun never sets' . The sun never set on the French Empire either, but most Frenchmen did not take pride in it. The white dominions peopled by millions of British migrants gave most British people a sense of kith and kin across the seas . Many indeed had kith and kin in the colonies . Most Frenchmen did not . The French overseas Empire on the eve of the First World War contained only 8 5 5 , 000 Frenchmen , over 600, 000 of them settled in Algeria. Many French settlers were hardly more aware of the Empire as a whole than most Frenchmen in France itself. While the colons might be passionately attached to the interests of their own par­ ticular estate or their own colony, only a minority had any broader imperial vision . The veteran colonial propagandist , Maurice Rondet-Saint , wrote at the end of a long career: Time after time I have been stupefied , when questioning settlers on the areas neighbouring their homes , to observe that they knew nothing about them and had never asked themselves what might lie beyond their everyday horizon . 1 0

Active interest in colonial expansion before the First World War was limited to two small and overlapping groups in French society : a minority of those politicians and civil servants responsible for colonial affairs and the militants of the colonialist movement . The branch of government with the greatest imperial responsibilities was , of course , the ministry of colonies at the Rue Oudinot . The ministry did not , however , administer all the Empire . The Algerian departments came under the ministry of the interior ; the military territories in the south were under the ministry of war ; the Moroccan , Tuni­ sian , and later the Middle-Eastern protectorates were the responsibility of the foreign ministry at the Quai d 'Orsa y. A series of attempts either to bring the whole Empire under the ministry of colonies or at least to establish a

France and the Pre-War Empire more uniform administration for North Africa all foundered on the reluc­ tance of each ministry to give up any of its prerogatives . Adolphe Messimy, a leading member of the colonialist movement and former colonial minister, declared bitterly in 1914: Bold initiatives, overall views, great projects in the national interest are pro­ hibited for France in Africa . But what does that matter provided that each department keeps its prey! In this French Africa where , despite the desert, everything-religion, men and the land-hangs together, the ministries act like francs-tireurs in complete independence one from another.

The com mission des etudes islamiques set up in 1911 to co-ordinate the policies of the various departments concerned with North-African affairs merely provided a further forum for inter-departmental bickering. The furious recriminations exchanged at the commission's second meeting be­ tween the representatives of the Quai d'Orsay and the Algerian adminis­ tration were described by one deputy as like something out of Zola's L 'Assom m oir. Even the Great War produced only a partial truce in the inter­ departmental warfare. A parliamentary report declared in 1920: 'We still witness the scandal of the frontier between Algeria and Tunisia where roads and railways stop short several hundred metres either side of the border because of the failure of the administrations concerned to reach agreement.' 1 1 The authority of the pre-war ministry of colonies, gravely weakened by its lack of responsibility for North Africa, was further diminished by its lowly status. An independent ministry of colonies was not created till 1894. Twenty years later it still remained 'the Cinderella ministry', at the bottom of the ministerial pecking order along with the ministry of public works. Because of its humble status, the ministry of colonies tended on the whole to attract the less able civil servants. No high flier in the government service who did not also possess a strong commitment to the Empire was likely to opt for a career in the unprestigious surroundings of the Rue Oudinot . The colonial enthusiasts, whether able or not, were few in number . Most officials in the ministry shrank from serving in the empire for which they were responsible. As minister of colonies in 1911, Messimy tried and failed to establish the principle that all officials in the ministry should gain first-hand experience by at least one colonial tour of duty. The storm of indignant op­ position forced him to back down: 'Some of these gentlemen would have re­ signed rather than leave Paris even for six months. ' 12 The general quality of the colonial administration proper, which re­ mained distinct from the officials of the ministry until 1942, was lower still . As in the ministry there were a few committed colonialists, and the Ecole Coloniale, founded in 1887, was also slowly raising administrative stan­ dards. According to their files, however, a third of the colonial ad-

2.0

France and the Pre- War Empire

ministrators in Black Africa recruited before the First World War were con­ sidered incapable even by governors whose own competence was sometimes suspect. Within the colonial administration proper only the governor­ generalship of Indochina was sufficiently prestigious to attract from time to time leading politicians such as Paul Doumer and Albert Sarraut . The lower ranks of the pre-war Indochinese administration appear to have been scarce­ ly more competent and scarcely more committed to the civilizing mission than their counterparts in Black Africa. The most junior French officials habitually addressed even the mandarins by the familiar and insulting 'tu ' . Reviewing the experience o f French colonization i n 1 93 1 , Albert Sarraut , now leader of the colonialist movement , confessed that one of France's gravest errors had been her choice of colonial administrators : To begin with, the colonies aroused such distrust that only the waste products of the metropolis were exiled there . Later on , having adopted a more rigorous selection process , we nonetheless persisted in the error of keeping a poorly paid white proletariat in junior positions which natives could and should have oc­ cupied. Its dealings with the native were modelled on those of the settler. Its coarse manners and moral laxity did nothing to add to the prestige of the rul­ ing race. 13

The main ambition of many colonial administrators from governors downwards was simply to spend as little time as possible in the colonies which they administered. A parliamentary report in 1 920 claimed that on average each colony changed its governor once a year : 'At the present time a governor who goes on leave is virtually certain never to return to the post which he has just left . ' The outbreak of war multiplied the opportunities and pretexts for absenteeism . The mobilization of the younger officials in the ministry enabled many more colonial administrators than before to re­ main in Paris as detaches temporaires. Their number mysteriously increased as the war continued . The staff association of the ministry twice protested to the Consetl d'Etat that during the war men 'of the most doubtful com ­ petence' had managed to establish a series of sinecures for themselves and their friends : The official was appointed first and only afterwards was an attempt made to find a job for him. This procedure led to the creation of a series of fantastic posts , none with any legal basis but all drawing heavily on the budget in de­ fiance of all the regulations . . . .

Those about whom the staff association was most bitter were the detaches temporaires from the colonies who had used their posts to evade conscrip­ tion : It is legitimate to ask how it was possible in the first place for detaches tem­ poraires fit for conscription to be excused or to evade this sacred duty to which

officials of the ministry-including a number who were over fony and were

France and the Pre-War Empire

2.1

deputy heads of department-had unanimously responded . These latter, far from deriving any advantage from their patriotism, have seen their promotions delayed and their posts taken from them. Is it right or just that soldiers proud to have served from the first to the last day of hostilities should thus see themselves punished by a kind of demotion? 14

The most serious problems of policy-making within the colonial ministry, however, derived less from the individual failings of its officials than from the general deficiencies of its organization. The Rue Oudi not had long been a byword for administrative confusion. Its own staff association complained in 1911 that the structure of the ministry was 'against the public interest' : 'It is a muddled assemblage of small bureaucratic contrivances.' The ad­ ministrative reforms which followed these complaints, according to their critics, only made matters worse. Their central feature was the creation of four great territorial services (departments) : Indochina, the Indian Ocean (including Madagascar), Black Africa and Oceania, each responsible for all the affairs of the region. Staffed by officials who could not pretend to the immense range of expertise required, the new departments were from the outset 'doomed to incompetence' : A single official has t o deal with the most diverse business . From a proposal dealing with direct taxation he moves on to consider proposed modification of the procedure followed before tribunals. He then tackles the problem of how to stop fluctuations in the exchange rate and, without having solved it, he has then to study new regulations proposed by a colonial governor . . . for the pro­ duction or sale of sugar , rubber , pepper or alcohol.

The 1911 reforms also established five administrative services of various kinds whose responsibilities partially overlapped with those of the geo­ graphic services. The result was bureaucratic nightmare : Each department, organized like a fortress, deals with the affairs of the col­ onies it administers from one particular point of view . The most frequent result-and this is one of the most common and justified complaints-is that three or four departments deal simultaneously with a question of principle whose settlement requires a single executive decision, and sometimes am·ve at

different solutions to it.

In theory it was the task of the secretanat et contreseing-the central secretariat-to co-ordinate the policies of the ministry's separate depart­ ments. But it was hopelessly unequal to its task. Colin, the head of the secretanat et contreseing from 1915 to 1917, had scarcely any discernible in­ fluence on policy ; he subsequently became one of three deputies to the head of the personnel and accounts department. 1 5 It is thus impossible to speak of the colonial ministry as representing a collective official mind. Indeed, it was notorious for 'the inability of all its officials to arrive at general views or to co-ordinate their efforts'. On each of

2.2.

France and the Pre-War Empire

the two occasions during the war when the ministry was obliged to devise a policy for the empire as a whole, it was forced to create a new department . In November 1 9 1 5 it established the Service d'uttlisation des produits colo­ niaux pour la defense nationale to co-ordinate the supply of colonial prod­ ucts for the war effort . Not until October 1 9 1 7 , however, did the ministry establish a Com mission de docum entation coloniale to prepare dossiers on its political war aims . 1 6 Besides the minister himself (when he was experi­ enced and strong-minded enough to impose his views), less than a dozen senior officials played any significant role in policy-making during the war . These officials tended to come from the ranks of those most committed to the colonialist cause. The reputation of the foreign ministry stood incomparably higher than that of the colonial ministry . It attracted many of the best French fonction­ naires, and its administrative problems-though by no means negli­ gible-never approached the chaos of the Rue Oudinot . In Lyautey , the first resident-general in Morocco, it also possessed probably the ablest of all French proconsuls . But the Quai d'Orsay , like the Rue Oudinot, did not represent a collective official mind of French imperialism . The foreign ministry's direct imperial responsibilities were limited to Morocco, Tunisia and , after the war, the Middle East . Imperial questions ranked far behind European problems in the order of the ministry's preoccupations. As in the Rue Oudinot therefore , though for rather different reasons, imperial policy tended to become the preserve of a minority of officials and diplomats rather than the concern of the Quai d'Orsay as a whole . During Pichon's five-year term as foreign minister ( 1906- 1 1 ) only a handful of officials had any signifi­ cant influence on Moroccan policy . Those involved in making Middle­ Eastern policy both before and during the war never reached double figures. As well as the policy-makers in Paris there also remained , as at all previous stages of French expansion , groups at the frontiers of Empire anx­ ious to push those frontiers back. As governor-general of Indochina from 1 896 to 1 902 Paul Doumer was continually straining at the leash to invade the neighbouring Chinese province of Yunnan . For a decade before the Fez expedition of 19 1 1 French generals in Algeria were anxious to begin the con­ quest of Morocco. But colonial soldiers and administrators at the beginning of the twentieth century no longer possessed the freedom from political con­ trol enjoyed by some of their predecessors . The days were past when French colonels in the Western Sudan could carve out a private empire free from in­ terference by Paris. No part of the globe remained where France could ex­ tend her empire without provoking opposition from one or more of her im­ perial rivals. Military insubordination on the Moroccan or the Chinese border now threatened to create diplomatic crises with other European powers , and for that reason it could no longer be ignored by the Quai d'Or­ say . Doumer's schemes for expansion in Yunnan came to nothing because of

France and the Pre- War Empire

resolute opposition from Delcasse (foreign minister, 1898- 1905). The generals on the Moroccan border were less successfully restrained than Doumer. But their acts of insubordination (sometimes connived at by the administration in Algeria and the diplomats at Tangier) were limited to comparatively minor infringements of an ill-defined frontier and other less ostentatious forms (such as bribery) of what Lyautey called 'discreet penetra­ tion'. Both Delcasse and Pichon were determined not to allow their careful diplomacy to be prejudiced by a military fait accompli. 1 7 The two African expeditions which provoked major international crises during the final generation of French expansion-the Fashoda expedition of 1896-8 and the Fez expedition of 191 1-could not be launched until they had gained sup­ port in Paris. Marchand was able to set out for Fashoda because he had the backing of the colonialist movement and a key group of senior officials and ministers. 18 General Moinier marched on Fez with the backing of the colo­ nialist leadership and the approval of de Selves, Pichon's successor at the Quai d'Orsay, and Berteaux, the minister of war. 1 9 By the 1890s the largest group actively seeking to influence colonial policy were the colonialists. For most of the nineteenth century France possessed colonialists but no colonialist movement. In the half-century after the Algiers expedition of 1830 separate groups of servicemen, academics , politi­ cians, businessmen and missionaries emerged from time to time with an in­ terest in, and an influence on, the course of French expansion. Both Garnier and de Brazza , for example, had influential groups of supporters in France itself. Not until the early 1890s, however, did those separate interests which had previously provided intermittent support for the colonial cause merge into a powerful pressure group dedicated to the expansion and mise en valeur of the French Empire. The colonialist movement was thus both a con­ sequence and a cause of French expansion. The passions generated by the first wave of colonial expansion under the Third Republic produced a colo­ nialist pressure group. That pressure group then helped to produce a further wave of colonial expansion. The colonialist movement was known to contemporaries as the parti colo­ nial. The colonialists did not, however, form an organized party in the modern sense. They were grouped together instead in a series of societies , most with a particular interest in some area or some aspect of French expan­ sion. Over fifty such societies sprang up during the quarter-century before the First World War, with overlapping memberships as well as overlapping aims but with few formal links between them. Nor were the colonialist socie�ies identified with any one political party. The parti colonial cut across normal party boundaries, though it was strongest in the centreground of republican politics and weakest at the extremes of left and right. The mildly chaotic structure of the colonialist movement reflected, at least in part, the

24

France and the Pre- War Empire

more general confusion of the Third Republic's political system. Until the formation of the radical party in 1901, France possessed no unified national party of any political complexion. Even afterwards party unity and party cfocipline remained notoriously weak. Until 1910 deputies were allowed to join more than one parliamentary party at the same time. During the first decade of the twentieth century more than a quarter of them did so. The underlying confusion of the party system did not end even in 1910. The kaleidoscopic variety of parties represented in the parliament of the Third Republic was still never the same from one election to the next. The kaleidoscope was further complicated by the continued presence in the Chamber of interest groups (including, notably, the groupe colonial, the parliamentary members of the parti colonial) drawing their supporters from several political parties. The parti colonial was small in size as well as confused in organization. The total (overlapping) membership of the fifty or more colonialist societies which functioned (sometimes briefly) during the quarter-century before the First World War never exceeded 10,000 and was probably below 5,000 in 1914. Most societies went little beyond publishing ephemeral reviews, put­ ting on lectures and organizing banquets. The never-ending series of colo­ nialist banquets gave the parti colonial its nickname 'the dinner party': to which one colonialist replied that while many associations were 'dinner par­ ties', the parti colonial at least dined well. 20 Only a handful of colonialist societies-chief among them the Comite de l'Afn'q ue Franfat'se, the Comite de l'Asie Franfatse, the Comite du Maroc and the groupe colonial in the Chamber of Deputies-had an important influence on the course of French expansion. The leaders of these societies formed the inner circle which until the First World War dominated the colonial party and determined its policies. They promoted most of the expeditions which unified France's African Empire in the 1890s. They led a less successful drive for the expan­ sion of French Indochina. Having brought Britain and France to the brink of war at Fashoda, the leaders of the colonialist movement then devised the formula-the barter of Egypt for Morocco-which became the basis of both the Entente Cordiale with England and the French protectorate in Morocco. 2 1 At the centre of this inner circle of colonialists stood Eugene Etienne, known to his supporters as 'Notre Dame des coloniaux', who as colonial under-secretary (1887-8, 1889-92) began the unification of France's African Empire. Etienne's passion for the Empire , endlessly restated in emotional speeches after endless banquets, derived in part from his upbringing in Oran by a father who had taken part in the conquest of Algeria. But it owed at least as much to his emotional attachment to the two great republican im­ perialists of the early Third Republic: 'I have been the friend of man cher Gambetta and of Jules Ferry. It seemed to me that my life would have no

France and the Pre-War Empire purpose , that I should count for nothing in the world unless I strove to be true to their teaching and to follow the path which they had traced for me' . 22 Etienne remained throughout his life the most devoted of Gambettistes, go­ ing each year on a pilgrimage to the great man's grave in the south of France on the anniversary of his death . Until his powers began to wane on the eve of the First World War, Etienne was the unchallenged leader of the whole col­ onialist movement. Most of the colonialist militants led by Etienne were professional men : academics , journalists , politicians, civil servants , diplomats , businessmen and officers in the armed services . The militants were so few , however, that they cannot be seen as representative of any social class or professional group . Most colonialists were of bourgeois origin , but most bourgeois were not colonialists . As the leading colonialist newspaper acknowledged : 'The bourgeoisie remains anticolonialist to the very marrow . ' Though some pro­ fessions were more represented within the colonialist movement than others , the colonialists were untypical of any profession and were a small minority in all . What colonialists had most in common was an attitude of mind . All at some stage in their personal relationships or careers-whether in politics , government service , business or the professions-had encountered the Em­ pire , sometimes by accident , sometimes at second hand, and had been fired by the vision of a Greater France . Many more Frenchmen , from similar social backgrounds and following similar careers, had also encountered the Empire and had not been fired by the same vision . What set the colonialists apart from other Frenchmen , therefore, was a psychological trait-their suscep­ tibility to the imperial vision-rather than the careers they followed . 23 For those who shared that vision , overseas expansion held the key to na­ tional greatness . In Etienne's words: 'We had to prove to Europe that we were not finished . ' During the final years of the Second Empire , Prevost­ Paradol had argued that , faced with the rapid expansion of Bismarckian Prussia on her eastern border, France could remain a great power inside Europe only by expansion outside Europe : in particular by building an African Empire on the southern shores of the Mediterranean . That argu­ ment became much more compelling after the humiliation of the Franco­ Prussian War . As Gambetta wrote to Ferry after the occupation of Tunisia in 1 88 1 : 'My dear friend . . . I thank you from the bottom of my heart . . . France is becoming a great power again' . And it was precisely because colo­ nial expansion seemed to offer France the means of 'becoming a great power again' that both Ferry and Gambetta became colonialists . 24 A number of French colonialists, not least Ferry himself, sometimes argued the case for colonial expansion in terms of economic necessity . It is essential , however , to distinguish the economic rationale with which Ferry and others sought to justify expansion, from the nationalist motives which made them colonialists in the first place . Failure to expand , in the view both

2.6

France and the Pre- War Empire

of Ferry and later of the parti colonial, would be 'quite simply the high road to decadence' . For France to be true to her destiny, she m ust 'spread , wher­ ever she is able , her language , her culture, her arms , and her genius' . The belief that 'France cannot be France without greatness' and that greatness demanded a great empire was the central article of the colonialist faith . The colonial party was the highest stage not of French capitalism but of French nationalism . The nationalism of the colonialists had a substantial cultural component . Unlike Britons, who doubted whether foreigners could ever learn British ways , French nationalists had no doubt that the values of French civilization were universal . Jules Michelet had apostrophized his country : 'France , Glorious Mother who is not ours alone ! ' Even his revolutionary contem­ poraries , Blanc and Blanqui, though preaching that the workers of all na­ tions were brothers, also insisted that Paris was the ville lumiere, the capital of civilization . The French , said Louis Blanc , were 'an inspired nation' . The British , on the other hand, were not : 'The principle of egoism is incarnate in the English people , the principle of devotion in the French people . England has set foot in no country without setting up her counting-houses . France has nowhere passed without leaving the perfume of her spirituality . ' 25 According to the philosophy of 'assimilation' propounded during the French Revolution , natives fortunate enough to find themselves under French rule were potential Frenchmen destined for full integration into the universal values of French civilization , irrespective of colour, creed or cultural traditions . By the First World War 'assimilation' had given way to the more flexible concept of 'association', which stressed cooperation bet­ ween ruler and ruled based on a degree of respect for native customs, beliefs and social structures . The natives were none the less to continue to receive all the benefits of the French civilizing mission. Among the chief of these benefits was the French language . Educated Frenchmen believed unquestioningly in the supremacy of the French language over all its competitors as the vehicle of precise , lucid , logical thought . During the nineteenth century , therefore , they viewed with dismay the expansion of the English language and the inferior values of British civilization . Linguistic nationalism was capable of infecting even revolutionaries . 'Are we' , thundered Blanqui , 'going to substitute for the pure , simple accents of our lucid language the mewings of the English? '26 Colonialists saw in the expansion of the empire a means to extend not merely French material power but also the French language and civilization . I n the final stages of French expansion , as the colonialists sought to secure French dominance on the southern and eastern shores of the Mediterranean Sea, the civilizing mission assumed a particular priority . Morocco , declared Etienne, was the last chance 'to extend the space occupied by our civiliza­ tion' : 'Our purpose in Morocco is not , as has been the case elsewhere , to

France and the Pre-War Empire establish French rule in order to develop our economic interests . What is at stake in Morocco , in the most critical way, is the whole future of France . ' 21 Not surprisingly , there was a substantial overlap between the leadership of the colonialist movement and of the Alliance Franfaise, founded in 1883 in the belief that 'making our language known and loved' would , inter alia, contribute to 'the extension beyond the seas of the French race which is in­ creasing too slowly on the continent'. Over a third of the Alliance's comite d'honneur and consezl d'administration (which included Etienne) were also active in the colonialist movement. 28 The colonialist commitment to the mission civzlisatrice was shared by most French missionaries as well. When the great French cleric, Lavigerie , had set out from France to become the first archbishop of Algiers in 1867, he had seen a vision of 'a new France rising from the shadows and disorders of an ancient barbarism'. It was Lavigerie's apostolate in North Africa which drew from the great anticlerical imperialist Gambetta the celebrated declara­ tion: 'Anticlericalism is not an article for export.' During the generation before the First World War the secretary-general of the Oeuvre des Eco/es d'On·ent, the main spokesman of French missionaries in the Middle East , was a disciple of Lavigerie , Monsignor Charmetant. According to the Oeuvre: 'Throughout the Mediterranean basin, it is our religious schools which spread most effectively our national influence , our language and our commerce. Our supporters have therefore the double satisfaction of con­ tributing to both the Catholic and the national interest, of working for the faith and for the Fatherland!' Charmetant believed that 'Christian civiliza­ tion is retaking , one by one, those unfortunate countries which, for cen­ turies past, have been placed under the yoke of Islam'. As in the Crusades , Providence willed France to take the lead : 'Help us , dear supporters, to add this new and glorious chapter to the Gesta Dei per Francos/'29 There were some supporters of empire within the colonial and diplomatic service who shared the colonialist vision of the transformation of continental France into an imperial Greater France . But there were others whose im­ perialism was less transcendental and more pragmatic. They had been turned by their careers into professional defenders of the national interest, anxious to defend that interest against the conflicting claims of other powers in those areas of the globe for which they bore responsibility. The supporters of the colonial cause within the government service and the colonialist movement none the less formed overlapping rather than distinct groups. Though they had sometimes arrived at common colonial interests by different routes , those common interests produced a high degree of interpenetration. The of­ ficials at the colonial ministry with the greatest influence on African expan­ sion during the 1890s-Archinard , Binger, Jean-Louis Deloncle, Haussmann , and Roume-were members or supporters of the Com ite de l'Afn'q ue Franfat'se. Similarly, most of those officials at the Quai d'Orsay with the

2.8

France and the Pre- War Empire

greatest influence on Middle-Eastern policy before and during the First World War-Berthelot, de Caix, Fran�ois Georges-Picot, Gout, and de Margerie-were members of the Comite de l'Asie Franfatse; eight of the nineteen members of the comite's section du Levant, formed in 1909, were diplomats. 30 Within the cabinet the colonialists could count, more often than not, on a degree of sympathy if not of active support from the foreign minister. Delcasse was a favourite son of the colonial party during the 1890s and entered the Quai d'Orsay in 1898 with the enthusiastic backing of the groupe colonial in the Chamber. Throughout his record seven-year term of office ( 1898-1905) he tenaciously pursued the goal of a French Morocco, albeit with a circumspection not always to the taste of Etienne. 3 1 Pichon, like Delcasse, was a founder member of the groupe colonial and throughout his first term as foreign minister ( 1906- 11) remained committed to a French protectorate in Morocco. But he was determined not to allow Etienne and th� Algerian generals to force the pace of French expansion: 'I consider our position in Morocco to be as favourable as possible. Let's not give the soldiers and the colonial party too many pretexts to interrupt the natural flow of events and launch us into adventures. ' 32 During a year out of office before his second term at the Quai d'Orsay (19 12-13) Pichon became both presi­ dent of the Comite de /'Orient and a founder-member of the Comite de Defense des Interets Franfats en Orient. As Clemenceau's wartime foreign minister ( 1917-20) he was to prove a staunch supporter of imperial expan­ sion in the Middle East. Colonial ministers, though more transient than foreign ministers, were even more dependable supporters of the colonialist cause. Because of the lowly status of their office, they tended to fall into one of two categories. Either, like Andre Lebon ( 1896-8) and Albert Lebrun ( 19 1 1- 13 ; 19 13- 14), they were already members of the colonial party and, unlike most of their contemporaries, actually wanted to be minister of colonies. Or they were men with no previous interest in the colonies whose ignorance of their new responsibilities (an ignorance sometimes of startling proportions) often made them vulnerable to colonialist pressure. Soon after Millies-Lacroix became colonial minister in 1906 he is said to have berated his chef de cabinet for failing to inform him of a revolt in a French colony. When asked which colony he had in mind, he replied 'Haiti'-only to be informed that Haiti had gained its independence a century before. Millies-Lacroix was, however, quick to recognize the influence of the parti colonial. 'Be well assured, gentlemen', he told a colonialist banquet in November 1906, 'that I shall follow the advice of my eminent friend, Monsieur Etienne _ '33 Both categories of minister-the committed colonialist and the ignorant but impressionable-were to appear at the Rue Oudinot during the First World War. Gaston Doumergue (26 August 1914 to 20 March 19 17) was a

France and the Pre- War Empire former colonial minister, already convinced that 'it is on the African conti­ nent that our most considerable interests are at stake, and there too that our sphere of action is largest'. 34 He was also a member of several colonialist societies and a past president of the Mission Laique, an organization devoted to furthering the civilizing mission through the expansion of secular educa­ tion in the Empire. Doumergue's wartime successors at the Rue Oudinot, Andre Maginot (20 March to 12 September 19 17), Rene Besnard ( 12 September to 16 November 19 17) and Henry Simon ( 16 November 19 17 to 20 January 1920) had little or no previous experience of colonial affairs. But once i? office all three were quickly converted to an ambitious colonialist programme. The enthusiasts of Empire both inside and outside the government represented, and knew themselves to represent, only a tiny minority of the French people. But the very indifference to colonial affairs of which colo­ nialists so often complained was, paradoxically, one of the secrets of the col­ onial party's influence. Had the transient governments of the Third Republic been less ignorant of, and less uninterested in, the implications of the imperial policies to which they allowed themselves to be committed, the colonialists' objectives would have been far harder to achieve. During the First World War successive cabinets abdicated much of their responsibility for the definition and negotiation of France's imperial war aims to the par­ tisans of empire in the Quai d'Orsay, the Rue Oudinot and the parti col­ onial. The ignorant apathy of a public opinion which the parti colonial had tried and failed to interest in the Empire also played into the colonialists' hands. Had the French public seriously debated the desirability of a Moroc­ can protectorate before the First World War, or of Middle-Eastern mandates after the war, it might well have rejected both. No such debate took place. Like its ignorance of Empire, the injured nationalism of French society made it vulnerable to a colonialism with which it was fundamentally out of sympathy. For France, unlike her main European rivals, the nineteenth cen­ tury was a period of relative decline. Perhaps as a result of that decline, public opinion, especially in Paris where it had most influence on govern­ ment, was peculiarly sensitive to any slight to French prestige. This sensitiv­ ity was noted by acute observers at both ends of the political spectrum. Tocqueville predicted in 1839 that the failure of the July Monarchy to pro­ tect national prestige would be more fatal to it than 'the loss of twenty bat­ tles'. In 1848, according to Marx, 'a series of mortifications to French na­ tional sentiment' was among those forces which 'worked like an electric shock on the paralysed masses of the people and awoke their great revolu­ tionary memories and passions'. 3 � Half a century later the colonialists were able to play on the same sensitivity with remarkable effect. The parti colonial could not make public opinion colonialist. But at moments of crisis it could none the less enlist public support for overseas ex-

30

France and the Pre- War Empire

pansion by presenting colonial issues as questions of national prestige. Though nationalist passions had been roused by colonial issues on isolated occasions before the 1890s, the sustained exploitation of French nationalism in the colonialist cause was peculiar to the last thirty years of French expan­ sion . Before the 1890s, though all colonialists were nationalists, most na­ tionalists were still opposed to colonialism. For a minority of French na­ tionalists during the 1880s, as for Ferry and Gambetta , colonial expansion outside Europe was the road to greatness inside Europe. But for most na­ tionalists, ranging from Clemenceau on the left to Deroulede on the right, colonial expansion , by diverting French troops and French resources from Europe, actually diminished French power in Europe. What resolved the conflict between these two opposing strands of French nationalism was the fusion in the early 1890s of overseas expansion with continental rivalries. The further colonization proceeded in both Africa and South-East Asia , the more it became a Scramble between European powers. This extension of European rivalries onto an extra-European plane brought about a remarkable change in public attitudes. In the 1880s , when French opinion was not simply indifferent to colonial expansion , it usually appeared actively hostile to it . The Tonkin episode in 1885 brought downJules Ferry's govern­ ment and wrecked his political career. By the time of the next Far-Eastern crisis-over Siam in 1893-there had been a remarkable reversal of roles. Now it was the French government , not the French public , which showed itself reluctant to continue a forward policy in South-East Asia . And in 1893 the government's decision to occupy a Siamese port was actually a response to public pressure . This striking shift in public attitudes had, at root , a very simple explana­ tion. The Tonkin crisis of 1885 had concerned no other European power than France . The Siam crisis of 1893 was seen in France less as a struggle with Siam than a struggle with England for influence in Siam. In the words of Delcasse , then colonial under-secretary: 'What arouses public indignation is not Siam but England , whose plaything we are not prepared to become.' The colonialists found it easy to turn this nationalism to the service of co­ lonialism. During the Siamese crisis Delcasse threatened to resign unless the government accepted his forward policy . The non-colonialist majority in the cabinet dared not accept his resignation because , as he told his wife : 'They know that public opinion considers me the man who refuses to kowtow to John Bull , and can imagine the press outcry at my-resignation : a resignation which would be rightly attributed to my refusal to agree to a surrender.' The imperial crises of the 1890s mattered to the French public not because of co­ lonial expansion , about which it cared very little, but because of rivalry with England , about which it cared a great deal. The Moroccan crises of 1905 to 1911 aroused so much passion not because of the conquest of Morocco but because of the conflict with Germany. 'Germany' , declared one leading im-

France and the Pre-War Empire perialist , 'has performed the greatest service for us by turning Morocco into a national question of the first order .' As soon as Egypt , Siam and tropical Africa ceased to be the foci of disputes with England , and as soon as Morocco ceased to be the cause of a quarrel with Germany, they also ceased to attract either the interest or the attention of the great mass of the French people . 36 The declaration of the Moroccan protectorate in 1 9 1 2 , though it achieved the great colonialist goal of the previous decade, paradoxically weakened the parti colonial. The resolution of the Franco-German quarrel over Morocco effectively ended , so far as the public was concerned , the European rivalries in Africa which had reconciled them to African expansion . With the parti­ tion of Africa now apparently complete , the colonialist movement-for the first time in its history-no longer had any clear and important territorial goal to aim at. The formal partition of the Middle East as yet appeared neither sufficiently imminent nor even sufficiently desirable to provide an alter­ native outlet for colonialist energies. The African wing of the parti colonial seemed to be running out of steam . The Comite du Maroc, formed in 1 904 to lead the campaign for a French Morocco, was effectively reabsorbed by its parent body , the Com ite de l'Afrique Franfaise. The Comite de l'Afn·que Franyaise itself, hitherto the most influential colonial society, held only two formal meetings during the period from 1 9 1 1 to 1 9 1 4 . Having elected thirty-six new members in the years 1 907 to 1 9 1 2 , the Comite elected none at all in 1 9 1 3 and 1 9 1 4 . The main African issue which preoccupied the parti colonial immediately before the First World War was one which divided rather than united it : the proposed reform of the indigenat, the system of summary native jurisdic­ tion , in Algeria. This issue ranged Etienne , the leader of the parti colonial, who sided with the colon interest , against a majority of the colonialists in the Chamber who supported reform and were sarcastically dubbed in­ digenophzles by their opponents . In December 1 9 1 2 the indigenophzles formed a groupe parlementaire d'etude des questions indigenes which was swiftly denounced by the more conservative colonialists as an 'instrument of war against the colons'. At almost the same moment the groupe colonial in the Cham ber, which for much of the previous twenty years had been a powerful parliamentary pressure group , disintegrated . Even the increased activity of the Middle-Eastern wing of the parti colonial could not disguise the fact that the colonialist movement as a whole on the eve of the First World War had lost much of its earlier elan . The Ligue Coloniale Franyaise, founded by Etienne in 1 907 to act as an umbrella organization for the separate associations which composed the colonialist movement, had claimed a membership of over 6 , 000 by the end of that year. In 1 9 1 3 it claimed a membership of only 2 , 600, some of whom were school -children . 37 The First World War was to revive the fortunes of the colonialist move­ ment. The prospect which it raised of the partition of the Middle East and

France and the Pre-War Empire the repartition of Africa gave the colonialists new goals to aim at. And the war allowed them, once again, to present questions of colonial expansion as issues of national prestige. The great mass of the French people had no real interest in Lebanon or Syria, in Togo or the Cameroons. But they could readily be persuaded that French prestige would suffer an intolerable affront if these territories were absorbed by the British-rather than the French-Em­ pire. The officials of the foreign and colonial ministries could scarcely play directly on the injured nationalism of the French people. The colonialists outside the ministries could and did. In the words of Frans:ois Georges-Picot, France's chief wartime negotiator on the partition of the enemy empires: In our day to day political life the parti colonial remains in the background, but there are issues on which it truly interprets the national will . When one of these issues, like that of Syria , arises , it comes suddenly to the fore, and has the whole country behind it.38

2

Pre-War Imperial Aims

France's imperial objectives during the First World War derived from the unfinished business of three distinct phases of French expansion during the previous generation. The scramble for tropical Africa had not given France all that her colonialist statesmen and militants had hoped for; in North Africa, the Moroccan protectorate of 1912 had failed to establish complete French control over all parts of the Sultanate ; in the Middle East, French im­ perial appetites had merely been whetted by the beginnings of the Ottoman Empire's disintegration in the years immediately before the war. One piece of unfinished imperial business, however, found almost no expression in French war aims. By 19 14 no significant body of official or colonialist opin­ ion any longer envisaged a major expansion of France's Far-Eastern empire. At first sight, this lack of interest in the Far East seems surprising, given both the importance of the existing Asian empire and the ambitious schemes for its expansion devised in the later nineteenth century. Though Indochina was not the largest of France's colonies, it was both the richest and most populous. Most colonialists in the 1890s had seen its conquest not as an end in itself but as the first stage in the construction of a much larger Asian em­ pire. They looked on Indochina's western neighbour, Siam, as 'a dying na­ tion', destined for absorption into the Empire, and they enthusiastically supported Delcasse's forward policy. In July 1893 Siam was forced to give France a zone of influence along the right bank of the Mekong River . An Anglo-French agreement in January 1896 implicitly recognized the ter­ ritories to the east and west of the central Menam valley as, respectively, French and British preserves. The outbreak of the Boer War in October 1899 raised hopes that Britain might be persuaded to let France have the Menam valley too. Etienne and his lieutenants in the colonial party urged their government to profit from Britain's difficulties in South Africa and demand a protectorate over the whole of Siam. 1

34

Pre-War ImperialAims

For many colonialists, Siam was to be merely the first step in the creation of a greater Indochina. The ultimate prize was Yunnan and South China. On the scantiest evidence, colonialists persuaded themselves that Yunnan was an Eldorado with 'potentially the richest mines in the whole world'. They also believed, as did many non-colonialists, that the Scramble for Africa would soon be followed by a Scramble for China . China's humiliating defeat in the Sino-Japanese war and the race for economic concessions which followed seemed to make a territorial partition inevitable. 'China', wrote the poet-diplomat Paul Claude! in 1898 , 'is not simply a sick man like Turkey. It is a corpse waiting to be carved up and offering itself to the knife of its own accord.' Leo Amery , the future British colonial secretary , wrote in his memoirs: 'No one was clamouring to see Queen Victoria Empress of China as well as Empress of India. But no one at the time of her Diamond Jubilee would have dismissed the idea as inconceivable. ' 2 The dispatch of an inter­ national force to deal with the Boxer Rebellion in the summer of 1900 seemed to. give the signal for the partition to begin. Just as the Comite de l'Afrique Franfaise had been founded in response to the Scramble for Africa, so Etienne now founded the Comite de l'Asie Franfaise in anticipation of the Scramble for China. But the Scramble , in a territorial form at least , never came . Britain, the most successful scrambler for Africa, did not want to begin again in China . Neither did the two great powers of the Pacific, the United States and Japan. By 1903 even the Com ite de l'Asie Franfaise acknowledged that China was likely to survive for at least a generation. 3 France by now was on the defensive in Siam as well. With the emergence of Japan as a great power and the conclusion of the Anglo-Japanese alliance in January 1902, the new threat of Japanese influence in Siam came to over­ shadow the old rivalry with Britain. Though Britain was blamed for helping to create the Japanese menace in the first place , that menace none the less persuaded the Comite de l'Asie Franfaise of the need for an agreement with Britain. Robert de Caix , the editor of the Asie Franfatse, insisted that the British must be blind not to see that Japan was as great a potential threat to their own Asian empire as to that of France: 'Our policy must be to work ceaselessly to open the eyes of the English to the profound solidarity of Anglo-French interests in Siam. ' By the summer of 1902 the leaders of the parti colonial were reconciled to a policy of Anglo-French co-operation in Asia as well as in Africa. Their objective now was to secure 'a sort of loyal Anglo-French condominium' in Siam and so forge a united front against a new , more menacing Asian rival. The Entente Cordiale of 1904 formally recognized the spheres of influence agreed in 1896 and effectively deprived Siam of British support in her efforts to resist French encroachments in the east. 'Siam', noted The Tim es, 'was quick to see the great change that had taken place in international relations .' In 1907 she formally ceded to France the provinces of Angkor and Battambang in the Mekong valley. 4

Pre- War Imperial Aims

35

With the Franco-Siamese treaty o f 1 907 the long history of French expan­ sion in East Asia came to an end . The parti colonial was now forced to look on Indochina as the limit of French Far-Eastern expansion rather than as the foundation of a still larger empire . This sudden contraction of Indochina's horizons inevitably dampened colonialist enthusiasm for it . That en­ thusiasm was further diminished by growing fears for Indochina's military vulnerability . As under-secretary and then minister of colonies in 1 893-5 , Delcasse had been one of the most outspoken champions of South-East Asian expansion . By the time he became foreign minister in 1898, however, his study of naval strategy had convinced him that the French navy would simply be unable to maintain the long supply lines necessary for Indochina's defence in time of war . The colony's senior military officer, General Borgnis­ Desbordes , reached the same conclusion in 1 900 : 'Indochina in wartime would be at the mercy of whoever wanted to take it over. ' Most colonialists kept their doubts about Indochina to themselves and to their friends . A few, however, were to make public profession of their apostasy. In 1 904 Onesime Redus published a book whose title became famous: Lachons l'Asie . Prenons l'Afrique. According to Redus, 'For our Indochina the present is truly splendid , but we are bound to hang our heads before the worries of the future . ' Indefensible in wartime , the colony would become insecure even in peacetime , for yellow men were far less tractable than black ones : 'There is something youthful , childish or infantile about the negro which we find charming . There is something decrepit about the yellow man which repels us as soon as we encounter him . ' Those prepared either to abandon Indochina or to exchange it for more desirable territory elsewhere were always a minority within the colonialist movement, but they were numerous enough to give cause for alarm both to the colonialist press and to the ministry of colonies . 5 Even the colonialist majority which retained its faith in Indochina now had much greater faith in the future of the African empire . One of the com­ monest images in colonialist literature of the early twentieth century was the vision of a Greater France , reviving the Empire of the Romans around the Mediterranean Sea, though now with an African hinterland running southward to the Congo . 6 The myth that 'the Mediterranean runs through France as the Seine runs through Paris' allowed colonialists to believe that the French Empire , though much smaller and poorer than the British , was yet in one important sense superior to it. Britain's Empire would never be more than a collection of overseas territories remote from the metropolis . But France possessed an empire on the southern shores of the Mediterranean which would forever remain an indissoluble part of the metropolis . It was this same sense of imperial superiority which was to lead Andre Malraux, listening to the orchestrated chants of 'Vive l'Algerie Fran�aise' from the Muslim population of Algiers when de Gaulle returned to power in 1958, to

Pre- War ImperialAims

ask proudly and scornfully : 'Whoever heard of Pakistanis shouting "Vive le Pakistan anglais"?' By 1914 France's chief imperial interests were thus concentrated in the Mediterranean and its African hinterland. For most of the later nineteenth century the main expansive drive had centred on tropical Africa. The over­ riding French objective during the final stages of the Scramble had been to unite all the French possessions into an unbroken empire stretching from the Mediterranean to the Congo. This objective was symbolically achieved in 1900 when three separate expeditions-from Algeria, from the Congo and from the Western Sudan-met on the shores of Lake Chad. But the symmetry of France's African empire thus united was spoiled by a series of foreign enclaves along the coast: British, German, Portuguese and Spanish colonies, and the independent state of Liberia. A sense of imperial tidiness alone made the acquisition of these enclaves seem desirable. There were also more co'ncrete considerations of security and trade . The enclaves provided alter­ native and occasionally superior access routes to the interior, like the river Gambia . They interrupted lines of communication, particularly between the Western Sudan and Chad. And they acted as magnets for both goods and people from the French colonies. During the War, thousands of Africans were to seek refuge from French recruiting sergeants by fleeing into neighbouring British colonies. 7 The most obvious place to begin tidying up the map was the British col­ ony of the Gambia, long regarded as a thorn in the side of Senegal . In the 1860s the British government had actually been willing to exchange the col­ ony for territory elsewhere, but desultory talks-and talks about talks-over the next twenty years achieved nothing. As part of the Entente Cordiale of 1904, however, Delcasse managed to obtain the easternmost reaches of the upper Gambia as well as a thin slice of Northern Nigeria and the Iles de Los off the Guinea coast . These minor acquisitions whetted colonialist appetites for more. The Com ite de l'Afn'que Franfaise claimed with unfounded op­ timism that the West-African clauses of the Entente Cordiale were merely a step towards the final solution of the boundary problem. In 1906 the governor-general of French West Africa, Ernest Roume, urged the govern­ ment 'to seize every opportunity' to extend French Africa's boundaries and free it from the foreign enclaves which hampered its economic development. In return for the enclaves, Roume himself was willing to make territorial sacrifices elsewhere in the world: in Inde Franfaise, Saint Pierre et Miquelon and the New Hebrides. 8 Over the next five years officials in the colonial and foreign ministries and leaders of the colonialist movement floated a number of schemes for obtain­ ing at least some of the foreign enclaves in West Africa by means of ter­ ritorial exchanges. But none of these schemes contained sufficient compen-

Pre- War Impen'al Aims

37

sation to tempt France's imperial rivals. The Quai d'Orsay and the Rue Oudinot , believing it more blessed to receive than give, ruled out any ces­ sion of French rights in the New Hebrides. The navy ministry refused to allow the surrender of Mangareva , a Pacific island in which the British had expressed some interest. Local interests and their parliamentary supporters blocked all proposals to abandon Saint Pierre et Miquelon or Inde Franfaise. The diplomatic priority attached to these various schemes for colonial ex­ changes was in any case so low , and the complexity of the schemes themselves so great, that they rarely progressed even from the drawing board to the negotiating table. 9 The colonial negotiations with Britain which con­ tinued intermittently after the Entente Cordiaie produced only an agree­ ment to resolve conflicting claims in the New Hebrides by establishing an Anglo-French condominium in 1906-and an agreement to revise the con­ dominium in 1914. The farcical consequences of these agreements were not an encouraging precedent for further colonial deals . The New Hebrideans were blessed with a French tribunal , a British tribunal , a mixed tribunal , a Joint Naval Tribunal, and a Joint Court with a Spanish judge and Dutch of­ ficials. Few knew just what each of these tribunals was supposed to do. The result , as an Australian commission complained , was 'an endless series of complaints as to the uncertainty of the law , the inertness of the administra­ tion, and the tardy dispensation of justice' . 10 The only significant boundary change in tropical Africa during the decade after the Entente Cordiale actually reduced the size of the French African empire. In November 1911, as the price for German consent to a French protectorate over Morocco , France ceded 250,000 square kilometres of the Congo to the German Cameroons. Neither the colonial ministry nor the colonial party was opposed in principle to territorial concessions in Equatorial Africa, the Cinderella of the African empire . 1 1 But the ex­ travagance of Germany's initial demand for the whole of the Congo and 'the insulting way' in which the demand was made aroused such opposition from a public usually indifferent to the remoter regions of Black Africa that the negotiations proved unusually tense. Germany eventually obtained two substantial salients giving the Cameroons access to the Congo-Ubangi river system: a sacrifice accepted by most colonialists as the necessary price for a French Morocco. 1 2 But the sacrifice was none the less resented , and the return of this lost African province was bound to figure among French objec­ tives in any future war against Germany . The Franco-German treaty of November 1911 confirmed the northward shift in France's imperial priorities since the heyday of the Scramble for Africa. By the beginning of the twentieth century , with the union of West and Equatorial Africa at least cartographically assured, the first priority for most colonialists was to complete French control over the Maghrib by acquir-

Pre-War Imperial Aims ing Morocco. By 1911 they regarded North Africa as incomparably more im­ portant than tropical Africa. The Congo, wrote Maurice Barres, was merely a 'colonial question' ; Morocco was a 'national question' . Morocco-in col­ onialist eyes at least-was not to be a colony in the ordinary sense. It was destined, like Algeria, for some sort of mystical union with the metropolis. Paul Bourde, the eminence gnse of the early twentieth-century colonial party, lyrically described Morocco as 'one of the finest countries in the world with thirty million hectares of usable land (half the area of France) and the possibility of one day having fifteen to twenty million of our compatriots resident there. And this country is at our gates, on our national sea . It is not a colony; it is a part of France herself!' 1 3 France, however, did not acquire either all Morocco or unrestricted freedom within the protectorate which she established in March 1912. The Algeciras Act of 1906, which had resolved the first Franco-German Moroc­ c�n crisis, had confirmed the treaty rights of other European powers and established a Moroccan state bank under international control. Although Germany undertook to renounce her treaty rights in 1911, France was obliged to confirm the principles of equal commercial treatment for all and non-discrimination in the award of railway and mining concessions. These restrictions, known collectively as the hypotheques intemationales, were all the more irksome for having been imposed by Germany . In addition, France had been obliged to give Spain a zone of influence including most of the Mediterranean coastline and the small enclave of Ifni in the south-west . The Franco-Spanish agreement of November 1912 placed this zone under the sovereignty of the Sultan and hence, notionally, under the French protec­ torate which extended over all the Sultan's possessions . But the Sultan's sovereign powers were delegated to a Khalifa who stood in the same rela­ tionship to the Spanish resident-general as did the Sultan himself to the French resident-general in Rabat. French authorities thus had no direct con­ trol over the Spanish zone which served as a refuge for Moroccan dissidents before the war and became a base for German subversion and submarines during the war itself. By far the most complex and time-consuming of the problems raised by the French protectorate was the status of Tangier. Though nominally part of the Sultan's empire , Tangier had been traditionally administered by the diplomatic community resident there. Tangier's special status had been con­ firmed by both the Entente Cordiale and the Algeciras Act, and Britain's recognition of the Moroccan protectorate had been made explicitly condi­ tional upon the acceptance of an international regime . Yet the details of this regime were still being debated when war broke out in August 1914 . Two months later British, French and Spanish negotiators finally managed to agree upon the terms of a statute placing Tangier under an international municipal administration. But the Spanish government refused to ratify the

Pre-War ImperialAims

39

agreement on the grounds that ratification might compromise Spain's neutrality. 14 The question of Tangier thus lingered on to complicate the diplomacy of post-war Europe, generating more paper and acrimony in pro­ portion to the interests at stake than almost any other issue in modern diplomacy. Both paper and acrimony derived in part from the administrative and legal complexities involved. When asked to explain the Tangier question to the foreign minister early in 1912, Paul Cambon (the ambassador in Lon­ don) was, for probably the only time in his career, lost for words. Lord Cur­ zon later warned the British ambassador in Paris: 'If ever you attempt to read the whole [Tangier] correspondence with its countless ramifications, your hair will be grey by the end.' 1 5 The Tangier negotiations were conducted in an atmosphere of mutual distrust and hypersensitivity. The Spanish delegate was on a constant lookout for any slight, real or imagined, to Spanish prestige. On one occasion he threatened to break off talks altogether unless the title of the Spanish engineer were changed from in­ genieur principal to ingenieur en chef 16 The British delegates were con­ tinually suspicious that French attempts to extend the powers of the Sultan over Tangier were really aimed at extending French control. Nor were their suspicions groundless. Although the French government accepted the prin­ ciple of an international regime, its officials in Morocco and the Quai d'Or­ say's bureau du Maroc did not-and they were the ones who determined the details of French policy. Their intransigence had little to do with concrete in­ terests. More often than not, the convoluted proceedings of the French negotiators simply reflected their determination to gain every possible ad­ vantage, no matter how marginal, on every issue, no matter how trivial. As Paul Cambon pointed out in July 1914, the status of Tangier could have been settled long ago if the negotiators had not 'tried to obtain a privileged position for us by sleight of hand'. In their obsession with bargaining tactics, they had forgotten the essential truths that an international Tangier was vital for the international recognition of the Moroccan protectorate and that, 'since we could not have Tangier for ourselves, our interest was to set up as solidly international a regime as possible in order to prevent Britain from establishing her own predominance'. 1 7 By August 1914 the course of French expansion in both North and West Africa had thus still to reach what most colonialists considered its natural frontiers. But the status of Tangier, like frontier adjustments in tropical Africa, stood very low in the preoccupations of European statesmen as they approached the First World War. Even for the parti colonial, these questions scarcely represented great campaigning issues. The prospect of further African expansion, though by no means abandoned, now appeared too remote to fire colonialist imaginations. For most colonialists, the crucial im­ perial question between the establishment of the Moroccan protectorate and

Pre-War ImperialAims the outbreak of the First World War was the extension of French influence not in Africa but in the Middle East , where territorial expansion had yet to begin . France's traditional policy in the Middle East had been to defend her in­ fluence in the Ottoman Empire as a whole rather than to work for that em­ pire's destruction . The most tangible source of French influence was finan­ cial . French investment before the war was more than three times that of Germany, the next largest investor . In keeping with French investors' notorious predilection for the often illusory security of government loans , 80 per cent of French capital went into the public debt. By 1 9 1 4 France held 60 per cent of the Ottoman public debt and supplied 4 5 per cent of the foreign capital in the private sector. 1 8 For most colonialists, however, France's 'moral influence' in the Ottoman Empire was even more important than her finan­ ci;tl stake . By the 'Capitulations' granted to a series of French monarchs from Francis I to Louis XIV, France had gained the right to protect French Chris­ tians and foreign clerics in the Turkish Empire . By custom, she also claimed the right to protect all Christians regardless of nationality, including Turkish subjects . According to both Catholic and colonialist historiography , the im­ pact of the French mission civtlisatrice had been felt in the Levant ever since the days of the Crusades . The Frankish crusader kingdoms had marked the beginnings 'not merely of French expansion but of a genuine movement of colonization' . It was the Crusaders too who were supposed to have estab­ lished 'the very special bond of union between the Franks of France and the world of Islam which has persisted ever since , despite the latent discord of race and religion' . The Ottoman Empire , therefore , was 'not merely a field of economic activity for France . It is also , and above all , a territory for the radiation of her intellect and the expansion of her culture . ' 1 9 Of the Ottoman Empire's Christian subjects , none were more devoted to the French than the Maronites of Lebanon who had fought with the Crusader armies of Godefroy de Bouillon and St Louis, and had finally accepted the authority of Rome in the sixteenth century. St Louis himself was supposed to have written : 'We are persuaded that this [Maronite ] nation . . . is part of the French nation , for its friendship resembles that of the French for one another . ' According to Maronite tradition , one of their principal patriarchs , St John Maro , was a descendant of Charlemagne . This seems unlikely since the patriarch died before Charlemagne was born ; but whatever the origins of the French connection , from the seventeenth century onwards Maronite leaders regularly appealed for French protection . 'We have ' , the patriarch declared in 1 7 1 5 , 'no refuge , no salvation outside the throne of France and its representatives in the Levant . ' The protection accorded by the Bourbon kings was continued by the Revolutionary governments and Napoleon Bonaparte . In 1 860 a French expeditionary force-its leader hailed as a new

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41

Godefroy de Bouillon-intervened to save the Maronites from massacre by the Muslim Druzes . The Reglem ent Organique of 1 86 1 , issued by the Turks under pressure from France and the great powers , made the Maronite stronghold of Mount Lebanon an autonomous province under a Christian governor. 20 Even the anticlerical governments of the pre-war Third Republic accepted Gambetta's mildly cynical dictum that 'anticlericalism is not an article for export' . Whilst rooting out clericalism at home, they continued to defend the religious protectorate in the Levant and to subsidize the work of the mis­ sionary orders . 'In the East' , wrote Jules Cambon , 'religion and nationality are indistinguishable ; the religious protectorate accordingly . . . contributed largely to the moral influenfe and hence to the political authority of France . ' Within the Turkish Empire the religious orders remained the main instru­ ment of the mission civtlisatrice. Maurice Barres wrote after visiting the Em­ pire in 1 9 1 4 : 'Beneath the banner of Christ [ the missionaries] preach the love of France with an ardour no description can exaggerate . ' He gave, as an example , a French lesson in a Marist boys school : 'The master puts the ques­ tion: "The word 'preference' . What is a preference ? Give an example of your preference". Reply : "I prefer France to Germany" . ' The journalist Maurice Pernot , on a similar fact-finding mission to missionary schools , reported with equal satisfaction 'the ease with which the pupils recount the history of Joan of Arc , the main events of the Hundred Years War, and recite from memory extracts from Le Cid' . On the eve of the First World War there were 70-90 ,000 pupils in French missionary schools . Thanks mainly to the mis­ sionaries , French had acquired the status of a semi-official language . Barres wrote ecstatically of 'the unbelievable fact that the seven newspapers read in Constantinople , the seven newspapers sold each morning in the streets , are in the French language ; and when an Englishman wanted to publish an English paper, he had to bring out a French translation'. 21 The 'moral influence' in the Turkish Empire which both colonialists and diplomats were so anxious to defend was , however, based on myth as well as on reality . The Orient in which most Westerners believed before the First World War was , in part at least, a figment of their imagination . The scope allowed the English imagination was at least somewhat restricted by the practical problems of political control over a huge arc of territory stretching eventually from India to Egypt . The French Orientalist imagination , unfet­ tered by the responsibility of power, suffered no such restraints . For Chateaubriand , Flaubert , Vigny, Lamartine , Hugo and many other writers, the Orient became-in Nerval's phrase-'the land of dreams and illusion' . 'The Orient' , noted Barres in 1 9 1 4 , 'seems to permit every whimsical fancy . ' Even Napoleon had embarked o n his Egyptian campaign in 1 798 intent not merely on threatening the British route to India but with more mystical no­ tions of laying bare the mysteries of the Orient : 'I saw myself founding a

4 2.

Pre-War Imperial Aims

religion, marching into Asia, riding an elephant, a turban on my head and in my hand the new Koran that I would have composed to suit my needs. ' The troupe of savants which Napoleon took with him bequeathed to posteri­ ty the justly celebrated Description de l'Egypte. That great monument of collective erudition was to inspire a renaissance of Oriental scholarship whose capital for the greater part of the nineteenth century was Paris. 2 2 The upsurge of French scholarship on the Oriental past did much to revive the notion of France's civilizing mission in the present. The president of the col­ onialist Comite de l'Asie Franfat'se at the outbreak of war, Emile Senart, was, appropriately, also president of the main society of academic Orien­ talists, the Societe Asiatique. Common both to Orientalists and to the statesmen who brooded over 'the Eastern question' was the conviction that the Arab Middle East was in­ herently unfitted for self-government. Balfour believed : ' You may look through the whole history of the Orientals in what is called, broadly speaking, the East, and you never find traces of self-government . All their great centuries-and they have been very great-have been passed under despotisms , under absolute government. All their contributions to civiliza­ tion-and they have been great-have been made under that form of govern­ ment. Conqueror has succeeded conqueror; one domination has followed another . . .

If the Ottoman Empire were to collapse, therefore, the European powers would be forced to step in. Arab nationalism at the beginning of the twen­ tieth century appeared in European eyes as a contradiction in terms. The French consul-general in Beirut declared in 1905: 'An Arab national senti­ ment does not exist among the people of this country, who are completely divided on questions of religion, rite and clan, and who by nature are destined to live for long if not for ever under foreign domination. ' 23 During the first decade of the twentieth century France's economic and 'moral' influence in the Turkish Empire both came under increasing challenge from her European rivals. Her stranglehold on the Ottoman public debt failed to give her anything approaching a stranglehold on the Turkish economy as a whole. As a prominent colonialist complained in 1906: 'Subscription to government loans has very rarely been followed by orders for French industry or concessions to our commerce'. French foreign investment and industrial exports went, by and large, in different direc­ tions. On the eve of the First World War France controlled 56 per cent of Turkey's foreign debt but only 13 per cent of her foreign trade. In her com­ merce with the great powers Turkey had a trade surplus only with France. One of the principal functions of the enormous French foreign investment was thus to meet Turkey's trade deficit with the rest of Europe. Remarkably,

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43

therefore , France's investment did more to promote her rivals' exports than her own. 24 In the Turkish Empire , as elsewhere , the internationalism of the French capitalist ran counter to the nationalism of the colonialist and diplomat. Robert de Caix wrote in 1 907 : 'The great power which we still retain is that of money . . . but on the express condition that this power is not debased by being put to the advantage of our rivals for motives of financial gain' . From 1 894 onwards the French-dominated Banque Ottom ane, the main channel of French investment in the Turkish Empire , showed a recurrent tendency to cooperate with foreign finance , in the form , notably , of the Deutsche Bank. Only the veto of the Quai d'Orsay prevented French banks from helping to finance the Baghdad railway, the main axis of German penetration in the Turkish Empire . Both the finance and foreign ministries echoed colonialist complaints at 'the tendency of our financiers to put French capital to work in the creation of foreign business enterprises' . 2 5 In the competition for 'moral' influence in the Turkish Empire , France showed a similar tendency to play into the hands of her rivals . It was already clear by the beginning of the twentieth century that the French religious protectorate was a wasting asset . Faced with the growing reluctance of Ger­ man and Italian missionaries to accept French protection , the Quai d'Orsay grudgingly acknowledged that 'We cannot , in fact , normally protect foreign nationals against their will' . The conflict between Church and State in France itself only made matters worse . The French religious protectorate was successfully challenged by both Italy and Germany in 1902 ; it was further weakened by the ending of diplomatic relations between France and the Vatican in 1 904 ; and it was still more gravely undermined by the separation of Church and State in the following year . True to the traditional Gambet­ tist embargo on anticlerical exports, the prime minister , Emile Combes , continued to insist that 'the treaties governing the protectorate will remain in force' . But the Third Republic's role as protector of Catholics was reduced to an obvious nonsense by the unresolved conflict with the Holy See. Combes' expulsion of most religious orders from France was also bound to hamper the very missionary schools which the French government continued to subsidize abroad . Because of the difficulty of missionary recruitment on French soil , French missionaries in the Turkish Empire tended, as they died , to be replaced by Germans and Italians . In a speech to the Chamber on the eve of war Georges Leygues, later one of the leaders of the wartime campaign for a Syrian protectorate, painted an apocalyptic picture of the plight of the m ission civzlisatn'ce: 'Since 1902 the personnel of the French Oriental mis­ sions have shrunk by half from about 2 , 000 to about 1 , 000. As a result , if the present state of affairs continues , in ten years' time-indeed in less than ten years' time-the French schools will have disappeared'. Barres returned from the Middle East in 1 9 1 4 , also convinced that 'in a few years' time we

44

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shall have been replaced there by Italians and by Germans. Our intellect and our language will disappear, and-worse still-a spirit of generosity and a warm, enthusiastic side of human nature which will not be replaced. ' 26 During the first decade of the twentieth century, however, the various threats to French influence in the Turkish Empire, even in Syria and Lebanon, the heartland of la France du Levant, attracted remarkably little attention in France itself. Even the Comt'te de /'Aste Franfaise almost ig­ nored the problem. In the years 1901 to 1910 less than one per cent of the space in its monthly bulletins was devoted to Syrian and Lebanese affairs. Most colonialist energies, as well as what time government and public opin­ ion had to spare for colonial affairs, were concentrated on Morocco. Paul Cambon, himself a former ambassador in Constantinople, wrote in 1912 that 'the lack of initiative in our Syrian policy has made both natives and foreigners doubt the attachment of the French government to its traditions in, this country. It has also made French public opinion lose sight of our in­ terests. With Morocco monopolizing public attention for the past decade or more, French opinion has forgotten even the name of Syria'. 2 7 Not until 1911 did the affairs of the Turkish Empire in general and of Syria in particular begin to preoccupy some French diplomats and a section of the colonialist movement. At the root of their common preoccupations was the suspicion that the disintegration of Turkey-in-Asia had begun . Fear that France's rivals were already staking out spheres of influence persuaded them that France must do the same. France's sphere, they were convinced, must be 'la Syrie integrale', vaguely defined as stretching from the Taurus moun­ tains in the north to Egypt in the south and from the Mediterranean in the west to the desert in the east. It was with this region that France's historic links were closest and here that more than half the missionary schools and the greater part of French-owned businesses and railways were concentrated. The first public sign of the impending scramble for spheres of influence was the revelation in January 1911 of the Russo-German Potsdam agreement (concluded two months earlier) by which Russia sanctioned German con­ struction of the Baghdad railway in return for a free hand in northern Persia. Alarmed by this news, Pichon, the French foreign minister, summoned his senior ambassadors to Paris to review policy. France's first priority, they agreed, must be to secure her Syrian sphere of influence by extending her railway and port concessions. The Comite de l'Asie Franfaise reached the same conclusion. The need for action became all the more pressing when it was learned that the Ottoman government had included Alexandretta, the best port in northern Syria, among the concessions granted to the Baghdad Railway Company. 2s The external threat to the Ottoman Empire posed by the scramble for spheres of economic influence coincided with the internal threat posed by

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the emergence of Arab separatism . Hitherto , there had seemed little pros­ pect in the Arab provinces of the nationalist rebellions which had begun the downfall of Turkey-in-Europe . The 'Arab awakening' of the later nineteenth century had been a cultural and linguistic movement which barely possessed a political dimension . Even in Syria, the most advanced of the Arab pro­ vinces, the undercurrent of unrest against Ottoman rule had yet to take a gen­ uinely nationalist form . The Young Turk Revolution of 1908 was greeted by most Syrian notables as the dawn of a new era of constitutional govern­ ment in which both Turks and Arabs would share . But the honeymoon with the Young Turks was to be short-lived . It quickly became clear that the rul­ ing Committee of Union and Progress in Constantinople was out to create a more centralized Empire under Turkish domination with Turkish as its sole official language . Cautiously, Arab opposition began to organize itself in a series of political clubs and secret societies-some , like al-Fatat, later the nurseries of revolutionary nationalism . The British consul in Damascus reported in July 1 9 1 0 that 'the antagonistic sentiment as between Arab and Turk is beginning to permeate downwards to the lower classes and will soon no longer be confined to the Ulema, notables and grandees , and official circles'. 29 By 1 9 1 1 this 'antagonistic sentiment' had become a continuing preoc­ cupation of the Comite de /'Aste Franfaise. In January its Beirut correspon­ dent reported the gradual emergence of 'a movement of rebellion against the Constantinople government' . He believed it premature to expect a general Arab uprising but 'the question has now moved to the forefront of the anxieties caused by the present state of the Turkish Empire' . In the Co­ mite 's view France herself was partly to blame for the problems of Syria and , above all , of Lebanon : 'The very feebleness of our policy is at the root of Lebanon's political insecurity . . . There is an evident fear that we may allow the sacrifice to the Young Turks of the same Lebanese privileges we once had so much difficulty in extracting from the Old Turks .' 30 What most alarmed the Comt"te was the danger that , if France failed to reaffirm her civilizing mission, the Lebanese would turn to the false gods of Anglo-Saxon civilization and the English language . The poverty of Mount Lebanon had already produced a large emigration to the New World which , so French missionaries feared , was beginning to loosen traditional loyalties to France : 'There is a great longing for America and the world of big business . Land and houses are mortgaged to pay for long and costly journeys thither in the hope of making fortunes . . . This frantic emigration to America is a calamity for Lebanon . Once there , both faith and morals suffer shipwreck . ' Even in Lebanon itself the supremacy of the French language was under attack. Maurice Pernot discovered that : 'In certain parts of Lebanon where our influence is thought to be preponderant English is cer­ tainly better known than French ; at some points on the coast Italian too is

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making rapid progress. Elsewhere we are holding our own , but nowhere are we gaining ground. Our adversaries realize this and are redoubling their ef­ forts . ' In Beirut the facilities of the Faculte Franfaise de Medecine, the only French university in the Middle East , were easily outstripped by the rival medical school at the American Syrian-Protestant College. To meet the Anglo-Saxon challenge the Comite de l'Asie Franfaise , with the blessing of the Quai d'Orsay , launched in April 1911 an appeal for funds to rebuild the Faculte Franfaise. That appeal , the most important fund-raising drive undertaken by the colonialist movement since 1904 , became the centrepiece of a campaign to reaffirm the civilizing mission in la France du Levant. Within eighteen months enough money had been raised to lay the cor­ nerstone of a new Faculty in an emotional ceremony marked by the presence of the battleship Henri IV in Beirut harbour. 3 1 By the end of 1911 the Middle East was for the first time replacing Africa as the central concern of the French colonialist move1'ent . This transition wa� assisted by events in North Africa itself . In October Italy invaded Tripolitania, the last remnant of the Turkish Maghrib, thus striking a fur­ ther blow against the cohesion of the Ottoman Empire as a whole . A month later France and Germany at last settled their differences in Morocco. Col­ onialists were now free to concentrate their energies at the eastern end of the Mediterranean . Just as they had earlier convinced themselves that the secur­ ity of French rule in Algeria and Tunisia made it essential to take Morocco, so they argued now that control of the Muslim Maghrib made it essential to secure French predominance in Syria : 'The axis of French policy is in the Mediterranean . One of its poles is to the west through Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco . The other pole must be to the east : Syria, Lebanon and Palestine. ' 32 Desire to defend the eastern pole led immediately after the Franco­ German treaty in November 1911 to the creation of the Comite de Defense des lnterets Franfais en Orie nt, dedicated to the advancement of the French 'moral , political , and economic position' in the Middle East: 'The happy ex­ tension of our empire in the western basin of the Mediterranean must not make us forget that France still has interests of the highest importance in the Orient and that her privileges there carry with them duties which she cannot abandon .' The new Comite quickly commissioned the journalist Maurice Pernot to undertake an on-the-spot investigation of French interests in the Turkish Empire . The life of the Comite was , however , to be a short one. Many of its leaders , like Robert de Caix, already belonged to the older Co­ mite de l'Asie Franfaise . By 1913 the latter's growing concentration on Near­ Eastern affairs had persuaded the newer Comite that its separate existence was no longer necessary. In June 1913 the two Comites merged . 33 As the Comite de l'Afrique Franfaise ran out of steam after the establishment of the Moroccan protectorate, the more vigorous Comite de l'Asie Franfaise

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47

took over from it as the most active and influential branch of the colonialist movement. One other colonialist society devoted to French interests in the Near East retained a distinct existence. This was the Amis de l'On'ent, founded in 1908 on the initiative of two naturalized Syrian immigrants : Shukri Ganem, a Maronite from Beirut who had moved to Paris in 1888 after a brief career in the Tunisian administration ; and Georges Samne, a Greek Melchite doctor from Damascus who had also settled in Paris after a period in North Africa. Ganem and Samne became, respectively, joint vice-president and secretary­ general of the new association. The presidents and other vice-presidents before and during the war were usually prominent members of the col­ onialist movement. At its foundation in the aftermath of the Young Turk Revolution in 1908 , the Amis de l'On·ent professed only the vague aim of joining 'in a common endeavour' all those interested in furthering the 'prog­ ress' of the Orient'lind its relations with Europe. In 1912 the association changed its name to the Com ite de l'On·ent. In response to growing Euro­ pean rivalries and the internal problems of the Turkish Empire it changed its character as well: 'Hitherto we have been almost solely concerned with pro­ viding information on questions affecting the Orient . . . Henceforth it will not suffice to study these questions ; we must assist in their solution . ' 34 The separate existence of the Comite de l'On'e nt and the Com ite de l'Asie Franr;aise, despite the similarity of their aims, reflected in part simply the fissiparous tendencies of the colonialist movement as a whole. But it reflected also a significant difference of emphasis between the two associa­ tions. The Comite de l'On·ent placed greater stress on collaboration with the Francophile inhabitants of the Turkish Empire. Within France it drew sup­ port both from Francophile Syrian em igres (most of them naturalized Frenchmen) and from the liberal wing of the colonialist movement. Its pre­ war leaders included a number of prominent parliamentary campaigners for reform of the colonial indigenat: among them Georges Leygues, Lucien Hubert and Etienne Flandin. 35 Flandin and Leygues (neither of whom joined the Comite de l'Asie Franr;aise until the war years) were to emerge as the wartime leaders of what became known as the French 'Syrian party' (the Syrian pressure group within the colonialist movement). Both insisted on the need for a far more liberal regime in a future French Syria than the ex­ isting regime in French North Africa. And both were prepared to go much further in their pre-war discussions with Syrian separatists than either the diplomats of the Quai d'Orsay or the more cautious leaders of the Com ite de /'Aste Franr;aise. 36 Allied to the colonialist movement was the Com ite Libanais de Pans, founded by Shukri Ganem in the summer of 1912, one of a series of em igre societies established in the various centres of the Lebanese diaspora before the First World War. Ganem was the only Lebanese or Syrian emtgre with a

Pre-War Imperial Aims public reputation in pre-war France . Though president of the Ottoman chamber of commerce in Paris as well as a writer, Ganem owed his reputa­ tion chiefly to the box-office success of his poetic drama Antar, first pro­ duced in 1 9 1 0 . Antar offered a remarkably romantic vision of the rise of the Arab people : . . . Rien n 'arrete un peuple en marche, II mantelje le vois monter de marche en marche Du levant au couchant dans un telflamboiement Que l'astre d'or pa/it au fond du firmament. By the outbreak of war Ganem was being groomed by the Quai d'Orsay and some leading colonialists as the authentic interpreter of the Syrian national will . In reality , however, he was a tragicomic figure of slight importance in the Arab national movement . While he eulogised Arabic as 'a sacred language ', he was forced to confess to an Arab newspa- in 1 9 1 0 : 'Twenty­ eight years spent in France have made me forget my mother tongue . ' Even to his friends Ganem appeared 'at first sight typically Parisian-lively and ur­ bane with a slightly ironic smile . . . ' . 3 7 Ganem did not even represent the aspirations of most Maronites. True to the exotic vision of Arab unity in An­ tar, he believed in a federated Greater Syria. Most Maronites increasingly thought in terms of an independent Greater Lebanon . The position accorded Ganem by both the Quai d'Orsay and some promi­ nent colonialists clearly owed much to political expediency . But it also reflected a substantial degree of self-deception . Ganem's endless repetition of Syria's debt to the civilizing mission so exactly fitted the stereotype of filial Arab gratitude for the blessings of French civilization heaped upon the Arab people for the better part of a millennium that his pretensions were ac­ cepted . He had the knack of saying eloquently and emotionally what many colonialists and diplomats wanted to hear . Other , less congenial expressions of the Syrian national will received much less attention . The secret society , al-Fatat, founded by Arab students in Paris in 1 9 1 1 ( though moving to Beirut two years later) , which was later to play a role of great importance in the Arab national movement , was not noticed by the French authorities at all . 3s The leaders of the Maronite community in Lebanon itself represented yet another pressure group committed to the expansion of France's civilizing mission . Their initial aim was to win French support for their campaign against their governor, Yusuf Pasha , whom they accused of seeking to -deprive them of the autonomy guaranteed by the Reglement Organique of 186 1 . In response to their pressure, supported by Ganem and the Comite Libanais de Paris, the French took the lead in lengthy negotiations which led in December 1 9 1 2 to a Turkish promise of reforms and the appointment of an Armenian Catholic as governor of Mount Lebanon . Despite its imperfec-

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tions, the agreement was hailed by the president of the Comite de l'Asie Franfat'se as proof that 'we remain conscious of our historic duty'. 3 9

The character of Lebanese opposition to Turkish rule had , however , already been transformed by the outbreak of the Balkan Wars in October 1912. As Turkish forces crumbled before the combined onslaught of Bulgars, Serbs and Greeks, Coulondre, the acting consul-general in Beirut , reported a Lebanese plan t o launch an insurrection while the Turks were oc­ cupied in Europe. Even the entourage of the Maronite patriarch was said to be sympathetic to the plot. The thousand or more French missionaries in the Middle East were also inclined to sympathize with separatist aspirations. Monsignor Charmetant , director of the Oeuvre des Eco/es d'Orient, wrote privately to subscribers early in 1912: 'It is clear that for several years Turkey has been moving towards a disintegration which is now not far off'. The Italian conquest of Tripolitania , like the French conquest of the Maghrib, revealed the design of Providence to replace 'the yoke of Islam' by Christian civilization. The missions therefore urgently required more funds in order to 'prepare the way , on the spot, for the definitive protectorate of France over Palestine and Syria. The alternative is for a nation of heretics to take posses­ sion of them ! The tomb of Our Lord, His sacred manger and all the other Holy Places of the Gospels and the Bible must not, at any price , pass into the hands of German Lutherans or English Protestants!' 40 There were signs of sympathy for the separatists even within the French government. The acting consul-general in Beirut warned in October 1912 that 'if the Lebanese took arms they would naturally appeal to France , thus forcing us either to intervene or to remain deaf to their appeal and thereby dash the hopes which for the past fifty years they have placed in us'. The Quai d'Orsay believed that a Lebanese rising would be premature. If a rising took place, however, it accepted that France could not stand aside. Accord­ ingly, Raymond Poincare (prime minister and foreign minister during 1912) ordered his representatives in the Middle East 'whilst counselling caution to those who approach you , . . . not to allow their traditional sympathies for France to decay'. If necessary these 'sympathies' could be preserved from decay by 'subsidies' from the foreign ministry's fonds secret. 4 1 What concerned Poincare most of all in the closing months of 1912 was the danger that the Lebanese, if disillusioned with the French, would turn to the British instead. British agents in Egypt had long been suspected, and with good reason , of harbouring designs on Syria as a further line of defence for the route to India. Fears of a British plot reached fever pitch during a visit by Cairo officials to Syria in November 19 12. French diplomats in Syria and Egypt, the Comite Libanazs in Paris and various spokesmen for the col­ onialist movement were all convinced that the whole future of la France du Levant was in mortal danger: 'Syria is a ripe fruit within the grasp of whoever wishes to pluck it. Unless we take care, it will fall from the Ottoman tree,

Pre- War Imperial Aims perhaps in the near future , and land in the neighbouring [Egyptian] garden . ' Po in care , now nearing the end of his year as prime minister and foreign minister, took personal charge of the crisis. In December 1 9 1 2 he obtained from Grey, the British foreign secretary , a formal statement of British desinteressement and then publicly declared France's determination to ensure 'respect' for her 'traditional interests' in Syria and Lebanon . 42 Poincare's handling of the Syrian question during 1 9 1 2 provides a strik­ ing example of the reactive nationalism which was so important a compo­ nent of French imperial policy . During his early career he had shown himself a fervent nationalist with a particular devotion , as a Lorrainer, to the lost provinces . Until the eve of taking office , however, he had shown no discern­ ible interest in Syria. Only when persuaded that the Anglo-Saxons were threatening to step into French shoes did he become an ardent defender of France's Syrian mission . He was to remain so after his election as President in January 1 9 1 3 , a position from which-at least until the outbreak of war-he continued to exercise an important influence on foreign policy . Poincare also remained in close contact with the Asian wing of the colonialist movement . In December 19 1 1 he had become one of the forty-seven founder members of the Comite de Defense des Interets Franfais en on·e nt. He also joined the Comite de l'Asie Franfaise and publicly acknowledged the 'debt of gratitude' he owed for its support in 1 9 1 2 . 43 Poincare's successors at the Quai d'Orsay until the general election of May 1 9 14 were all present or past leaders of colonialist societies with a particular interest in the Mediterranean Empire . Charles Jonnart (foreign minister from January to March 1 9 1 3 ) was president of the Comite de l'Afn·q ue Franfaise from 1 9 1 2 to 192 7 ; Pichon (foreign minister from March to December 1 9 1 3 ) had been president of the Comite de l'On·ent in 1 9 1 1 - 1 2 ; Gaston Doumergue (prime minister as well as foreign minister from December 1 9 1 3 to June 19 14) was a past president of the Mission Lai"que. None of Poincare's successors, however, dominated the Quai d'Orsay in the way that he had done . The main Middle-Eastern policy-makers up to the outbreak of war tended to be the permanent officials . The three most in­ fluential of them-Philippe Berthelot , sous-directeur d'Asie from 1 907 to 1 9 1 3 , Jean Gout, his successor from 1 9 1 3 to 1920, and Rene Ristelhueber , secretary of the Quai d'Orsay's commission des affaires syn·ennes-were members of the Comite de l'Asie Franfaise. With France's title to Syria at least partly secured by Grey's assurances in December 1 9 1 2 , the emphasis of French policy during 1 9 1 3 shifted back to the preservation of the Ottoman Empire . Both the Quai d'Orsay and the co­ lonialists were well aware that Germany's share in a partition would be far greater than that of France : 'The French would perhaps receive Syria as their share of the Empire's remains . But that could in no way compensate for the

Pre-War Imperial Aims political , economic and moral catastrophe for France which would result from the possible occupation of Anatolia or part of Asia Minor by Germany . ' The greatest 'catastrophe' of partition would be to end the primacy of the French language : 'Everything torn away from Turkey is also lost to the French language . . . We can scarcely hope to find in the Orient , outside the Turkish Empire , Turkish or Arab authors who choose our language in which to write and who sometimes use it with such genuine talent . . . If Turkey were to be dismembered the losses to what may be called our cultural do­ main would quickly become irreparable . ' The Quai d'Orsay defined the basis of its policy now as 'not ambition but precaution' . Whilst continuing as a 'precaution' to stake out its claim to Syria , French policy now was chiefly concerned to delay partition for as long as possible. 44 The foreign ministry's dealings with the Arab separatists during 1 9 1 3 were more distinctly cautious than in the crisis of 1 9 1 2 . I n January 1 9 1 3 a Reform Committee of Christians and Muslims was established in Beirut. Alarmed by growing support in Syria and Iraq for the Committee's pro­ gramme of devolution , the Turkish authorities reacted by dissolving it in April . The reformers then decided to call an Arab Congress to meet in Paris during June . The Quai d'Orsay's first , embarrassed reaction to the prospect of playing host to a gathering whose demands might go some way beyond autonomy was to try to have the Congress postponed . When postponement proved impossible it reluctantly concluded that 'the meeting could not be banned without doing grave damage to French influence in Syria . ' All the ministry could do now was , as Ganem advised , to try to manipulate it . In the event the programme adopted by the Congress was similar to that put forward by the Beirut Reform Committee a few months earlier. Having failed to have the Congress banned , the Turkish government then conceded most of its demands : far greater devolution , the obligatory use of Arabic in all provinces with an Arab majority , and the appointment of foreign inspectors in every vtlayet. 4 5 Both the Quai d'Orsay and the Comite de l'Asie Franyaise greeted the outcome with relief. The Comite congratulated the participants on 'repudiating all separatist ideas and not supporting the dreams of those who preach the Arab revolt' . Nevertheless, both colonialists and diplomats were well aware that plenty of 'separatist ideas', some involving violent insurrec­ tion, had in fact been floated . According to the Quai d'Orsay's informants, there had been three main factions at the Congress : the pro-French Beirut delegation led jointly by an amenable Muslim , Ahmad Bayhum , and a Christian , Khalil Zenie , who took his instructions from the foreign ministry ; a group led by Nadra Mutran , a Greek Melchite from Baalbeck 'strongly in­ clined to separatism and without serious attachment to France' ; and a Syrian emigre group from Egypt led by Iskandar Ammun , an 'opportunist na­ tionalist' believed to be undecided whether to cooperate with England, with

Pre-War Impenal Aims France , or with neither. The Comite de l'Asie Franfaise , like the Quai d'Or­ say , trusted only the Beirut delegation . Its section du Levant disingenuously treated Zenie , Bayhum and their friends as the spokesmen of the Congress as a whole , assuring them of the 'sympathy of France and of the Comite ' . Mutran was given a quite different reception . A large colonialist meeting on French rights in Syria refused to allow him even to put his views . Mutran did , however, make contact with members of the Comite de /'Orient who spoke a less paternalist language than the leaders of the Comite de l'Asie Franfaise . It was probably during or soon after the Arab Congress that Mutran began the talks with Flandin and Leygues which were to lead to their wartime plan for a French-supported Syrian insurrection . 46 The euphoria which had followed the agreement between the leaders of the Arab Congress and the Turkish authorities quickly evaporated . In August 1 9 1 3 the Ottoman government published a watered-down reform programme which made it 'only too evident that nothing definite whatever has been granted ' . Various Arab groups quickly appealed to both France and other powers for pressure on the Turks to honour their agreement . Ottavi , the French consul in Damascus, and probably some of his colleagues as well , encouraged Arab leaders to believe that France would make a new loan to the Turkish government contingent on the satisfactory progress of reforms. But the Quai d'Orsay was reluctant to involve itself in any new campaign on behalf of the Syrians . French policy now was to 'work for conciliation be­ tween Turks and Arabs and scrupulously avoid any action which might prematurely open the Arab question' . 47 Until the outbreak of war the objective of both the Quai d'Orsay and the Comite de l'Asie Franfaise remained 'the survival of Turkey -in-Asia , one of the essential conditions of the Mediterranean balance' : 'Our moral and beneficent influence would be severely limited , indeed ruined , by a parti ­ tion of the Empire . ' With the continuing scramble for spheres of economic influence , however, partition remained a possibility . In keeping with its 'policy of precaution' , the foreign ministry therefore set out to secure France's title to 'la Syrie integrale' . A Franco-German agreement concluded in February 1 9 14 recognized a French sphere for railway development in Syria and northern Anatolia , and a German sphere along the Baghdad railway. A Franco-Turkish accord in April gave France substantial railway and port concessions within the sphere agreed with Germany and guarantees for her schools and missionaries. In return , France agreed to a new Turkish loan and the raising of Turkish custom duties . There was , however , no men­ tion of reforms within the Empire .48 The new French consul-general in Beirut, Franc;ois Georges-Picot , reported a 'feeling of profound discouragement' among the Lebanese once the terms of the Franco-Turkish agreement became known : 'Belief in reform of the Empire from within has disappeared' . Among Muslim leaders in Syria

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53

as a whole there was a sense of French betrayal . Lebanese Christians , Picot reported , still looked on France as their protector: 'But if she refuses to assist them , they will look elsewhere , and there is no doubt that others are ready to occupy the place left empty by France . . . . ' To prevent the Lebanese 'looking elsewhere' , Picot gave them assurances of French support which went some way beyond the more cautious policy of the Quai d'Orsay . By the outbreak of war he had established himself in the eyes of the Patriarch and other Maronite notables as the 'moral leader' of an eventual rising against the Turks. 4 9 The Franco-Turkish agreement of April 1 9 1 4 virtually completed the division of the Ottoman Empire into spheres of economic influence . The lion's share had gone to Germany, who gained a broad and continuous zone of influence stretching from Constantinople to Baghdad and the Persian Gulf. France , however , had failed to secure her claim to the whole of 'la Syrie integrale' . Syria north of Aleppo (including the port of Alexandretta) fell into the German sphere : a loss for which railway concessions on the Black Sea and in western Anatolia could not compensate . The Comite de l'Asie Franr;aise exonerated France's present negotiators : 'They were faced with the consequences of past weakness on such a scale that it was very dif­ ficult to repair them' . Part of the responsibility , the Comite believed , lay with the earlier inertia of French diplomacy . But far greater blame attached to the inertia of French businessmen : 'Anatolia is on the move because its business is in the hands of Germans. Palestine and Syria are stagnant because their business is in the hands of Frenchmen . That is what every traveller hears , from Jaffa to Tripoli'. The same view of French business enterprise in Syria was held by both the senior officials of the Quai d'Orsay and the French diplomats in the Middle Eas t . Bompard , the ambassador in Constantinople , denounced 'their petty , narrow-minded ideas and methods which have helped to sterilize French action' . Boppe , his charge d'affaires , was equally scathing : 'Instead of contributing to our prestige , our businesses in Syria , badly managed and badly developed , serve rather to diminish it' . 50 A curious schizophrenia was evident in colonialist attitudes to Syria on the eve of the First World War . On the one hand , colonialists complained of the many challenges to French influence in Greater Syria; on the other hand , they continued to believe as an article of faith that French influence was unchallengeable . Pernot's report to the Comite de Defense des Interets Franr;ais en Syrie in 1 9 1 3 attacked the inertia of French business , 'the mediocrity of most of our schools in Lebanon ', the 'very variable quality' of French primary education throughout Syria , and the Germanophile tenden­ cies of the Muslim press. Yet Pernot continued simultaneously and stub­ bornly to insist : 'Everywhere France is known , everywhere she is blessed . With the inhabitants of these countries, no matter what their race or their religion , there is no better guarantee , no more effective recommendation for

Pre-War Impen"al A im s :::� ::-1\ e::e[. : �..1r: ��" � e Frenc h . · T1..) .1 r least Slime di p lomats rhe conrradic­ ::,':-: ::: .:,aul Cambon MSS (Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres, PA 42) :::Iemenceau MSS (Service Historique de l'Armee, 6 N 72ff) ':omite Franyais pour l'Outre-Mer (formerly Union Coloniale Franyaise) MSS (Archives Na­ tionales, Section Outre-Mer) :::ordier MSS (Bibliotheque de l'Institut de France, 5437, 5446, 546 1 , 5482) :::oulondre MSS (Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres, PA 5 1 ) :::rewe MSS (Cambridge University Library) :::urzon MSS (Public Record Office, FO 800/ l 53, 1 5 7) :::urzon MSS (India Office Library, Eur. F 1 12 / 196-200, 235, 237-8, 289) )ard MSS (Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres, PA 53) )efrance MSS (Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres, PA 56) )elcasse MSS (Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres) )oumergue MSS ( Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres) )ucrocq MSS (Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres, PA 202) 1Jandin MSS (Archives Nationales, in process of classification) )e Fleuriau MSS (Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres, PA 72) iout MSS (Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres, PA 196)

Hardinge MSS (Cambridge University Library) Lebrun MSS (Archives Nationales, Section Outre­ Mer, PA 1 0) Lloyd George MSS (House of Lords Record Office) De Margerie MSS (Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres, PA 1 1 3) Manineau MSS (Archives Nationales, Section Outre-Mer, AP 3) Millerand MSS (Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres, PA 1 1 8) Millerand, 'Mes Souvenirs, 1859-1941' (typescript in the possession of M. Jacques Millerand) Painleve MSS (Archives Nationales, 3 1 3 AP) Paleologue MSS (Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres, PA 1 33) Pichon MSS (Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres, PA 141) Pichon MSS (Bibliotheque de l'Institut de France , 4397) Poincare MSS (Bibliotheque Nationale, n.a. fr. 16029-34) Societe de Geographie MSS (Bibliotheque Nationale, department des canes et plans) Sykes MSS (Public Record Office, FO 800/221) Sykes MSS (St Antony's College, Oxford) Tardieu MSS (Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres, PA 166) Tardieu MSS (Archives Nationales, 324 AP) Terrier MSS (Bibliotheque de l'Institut de France, 5893, 5898, 590 1 , 5903 , 5905, 5907, 591 1 , '.>960, )986-7 , 5990, 6016-7)

II Ministerial Archives (France)

Only general classifications are listed here. Detailed references to specific files are given in the notes. 1 MINISTERE DES AFFAIRES ETRANGERES , QUA! o'ORSAY

Nouvelle Sen·e : Grande-Bretagne; Maroc; Oceanic; Turquie Serie A Guerre: Afrique; Espagne; Sionisme; Turquie Sen·e A Paix: Colonies allemandes; Demembre­ ment de l'empire ottoman; Enquete inter­ ministerielle Serie Afrique: 1918-1940: Afrique; Egypte

Sources Serie Asie: 1918-1929: Inde; Oceanie Sine Europe: 1918- 1 929: Espagne; Grande­

2 FOREIGN OFFICE PA PERS FO 3 7 1 (post 1 905); FO 608 (Peace Conference)

Serie Levant: 1918- 1 929: Arabie; Palestine; Syrie­

3 WAR OFFICE PAPERS WO 106 (Director of Military Operations and Intel­ ligence)

Bretagne

Liban; Turquie

sen·e Maroc: 191 7-1940: Tanger; Z.One espagnole du Maroc

4 FOREIGN OFFICE CONFIDENTIAL PRINT

Sen·e Y (Conferences Internationales)

(Incomplete series also available in Cambridge Uni­ versity Library).

2 MINISTER£ DES COLONIES, ARCHfVES NATIONALES (SECTION OUTRE-MER), RUE OUDINOT

V Official Publications

Fonds Affaires Politiques Fonds Affaires Economiques Fonds Missions Fonds Nouvelles-Hebndes Indochine: Nouveau Fonds

FRANCE

3 MINISTERE DU COMMERCE ET DE L'INDUSTRIE, ARCHIVES NATIONALES 4 MINISTER£ DE LA GUERRE, SERVICE HISTORIQUE DE L'ARMEE, VINCENNES

1924 . Ministere des Colonies: Annuaire du Ministere des Colomes. Paris , annual publication (with some gaps).

GREAT BRITAJN

III Parliamentary Archives 1 COMMISSIONS PARLEMENTAIRES, CHAMBRE, AR­ CHfVES NATIONALES C 7 5 58-9, 7561-2 : Commission du Budget C 7773:. Commission des Traites de Paix C 7490-91 : Commission des Affaires Exterieures et des Colonies 2 BIBLIOTHEQUE DE L'ASSEMBLEE NATIONALE, PALAIS BOURBON Commission des Affaires Exterieures, Chambre, 1920. Commission de l'Algerie, des Colonies et des Protectorats, 1920-2 1 3 BIBLIOTHEQUE DU SENAT, PALAIS DU LUXEM­ BOURG Commission des Affaires Exterieures, 1915-1919

Journal Officiel de la Republique Franfaise Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres: Documents DzPlomatiques: Documents relatifi aux negocia­ tions concernant /es Garanties de Secrm'te contre une agression de l'Allemagne, 1919-1923. Paris,

Senat,

Foreign Office: Documents on Bn'tish Foreign Policy, 1919-1939. ed. by R. Butler et al. First series, vols. I-XIX. London, 1947-74.

Parliamentary Papers: Correspondence between His Majesty '.r Government and the French Government respecting the Angora Agreement of 20 October 1921. Cd 1 5 7 0 (Turkey, no. 1 ) , 1922.

Parliamentary Papers: Papers respecting negotia­ tionsfor an Anglo-French Pact. Cd 2 1 69 (France, no . 1 ) , 1 924.

TURKEY

4e Armee Ottomane: La virile Stir la question syn·­ enne. Istanbul, 1 9 16. UNITED STATES Department of State: Papers Relating to the Foreign

Relations of the United States; Paris Peace Con­ ference. Washington, 1 942-47 , 1 3 vols.

I V Public Record Office, London (Crown-copyright material is quoted by permission of the Controller of Her Majesty's Stationery Office)

VI Newspapers and Periodicals

1 CABINET OFFICE PAPERS CAB 24 ('G' Series); CAB 42 (War Committee)

Only those journals consulted over a period of time are listed here. References to individual articles in other journals are given in the notes.

Sources L 'Afrique Franraise (Bulletin du Comite de l'Afn'que Franraise et du Comite du Maroc) Les Anna/es Coloma/es L 'Asie Franraise (Bulletin du Comite de /'Aste Franraise) Bulletin de l'Allz'ance Franyaise Bulletin mensuel de la Societe de Geographie Commerciale de Pans Correspondance d'On'ent La Depeche Coloniale La Ligue Franraise Mer et Colonies L 'Oeuvre des Eco/es d'On'ent La Presse Coloniale Revue des Questions Colonz'ales et Man'times Le Temps VII Published Works and Unpublished Theses Cited in the References Ageron , C-R. Les Algen·ens musulmans et la France (1871 -1919). 2 vols, Paris, 1 968. - France colont'ale ou parti colont'al? Paris, 1978. - Politiques colont'ales au Maghreb. Paris, 1 972 . - 'Les colonies devant !'opinion publique fran�aise, 19 19- 1939.' Cahz'ers de l'Instt'tut d'Hzstoire de la Presse et /'Opinion (Tours), vol. I, 1 9 7 3 . - 'Gambetta e t la reprise d e !'expansion col­ oniale . ' Revue Franfaise d'Histoire d'Outre-Mer, vol . LIX, 1972 . - 'L'idee d'Eurafrique et le debat franco-allemand clans l'entre-deux-guerres. ' Revue d'Hzstoire vol . Co ntemp o rain e , et M o dern e XXII , 197 5 . - 'Une politique algerienne liberale sous la Troisieme Republique ( 1 9 1 2- 1 9 19 ) . ' Revue d'Histoire Moderne et Contemporaine, vol. VI, 1959. Ajay, N.Z. 'Mount Lebanon and the Wilayah of Beirut, 1 9 1 4- 1 9 1 8: the War Years. ' Unpublished Ph .D. thesis, Georgetown University, 1973. Albrecht-Carrie , R. Italy at the Pans Peace Conference. New York, 1938. Allain, J-C. Agadir 1 91 1 . Paris, 1976. Anderson, M . S . The Eastern Question. London, 1966. Andrew, C . M . Theophzle Delcasse and the Making of the Entente Cordiale. London, 1 968. - 'Dechiffrement et diplomatie: le cabinet noir du quai d'Orsay sous la Troisieme Republique.' Relations Intemationales, vol. III , 1976. - 'The French Colonialist Movement during the

Third Republic: The Unofficial Mind of Im­ perialism .' Transactions of the Royal Hzstoncal Society, 5th ser. , vol. XXVI, i976. Andrew, C . M . Grupp, P . and Kanya-Forstner, A . S . , 'Le mouvement colonial fran�ais et ses prin­ cipales personnalites 1890- 1 9 1 4 . ' Revue Franfaise d'Histoire d'Outre-Mer, vol. LXII, 1 97 5 . Andrew, C . M . and Kanya-Forstner, A.S. 'France, Africa and the First World War.' journal of Afn'can History , vol . XIX, 1978. - 'France and the Repartition of Africa, 1914- 1922 . ' Dalhousie Revzew, vol . LVII, 1977. - 'French Business and the French Colonial­ ists. ' The Hzstoncaljournal, vol. XIX, 1976. - 'The French "Colonial Party": Its Composition, Aims and Influence, 188 5 - 1 9 1 4 . ' The Histon·cal journal, vol. XIV, 197 1 . Revised version in: Cairns, J .C. (ed . ) Contemporary France: Illusion, Conflict and Regeneration. New York, 1978. - 'The French Colonial Party and French Col­ onial War Aims, 1 9 14- 1 9 1 8 . ' The Histoncaljour­ nal, vol. XVII, 1974. - 'Gabriel Hanotaux, the Colonial Party and the Fashoda Strategy. • Journal of Impenal and Com­ monwealth History, vol. III, 1 974. - 'The Groupe Colonial in the French Chamber of Deputies, 1 892 - 1 93 2 . ' The Hzstoncal]ournal, vol. XVII, 1 974 . Antonius, G. The Arab Awakening. London , 1938. Auffray, B. Pierre de Margene (1861 -1942) et la vie diplomatt'que de son temps, Paris, 1976. Baillou, J . 'Discours de reception a l'Academie des Sciences Coloniales .' 1 5 June 197 3 [typescript). Balfour, M . The Kaiser and his Times. London, 1964. Barres, M . Une enquete au pays du Levant. 2 vols, Paris, 192 3 . Beer, G . L . [Gray, L . H . (ed . )] Afncan Questions at the Pans Peace Conference. New York, 1923. Beloff, M. Impen'al Sunset. Vol. I , London, 1 969. Benoist, C. Souvenirs. Vol. III, Paris, 1934. Berard, V. L 'Angleterre et l'impen'alzsme. Paris, 1900 . Berenger, H. Le petrole et la France. Paris , 1920. Bertie of Thame. The Dz'ary of Lord Bertie of Thame 1914-1 918. 2 vols, London, 1924. Betts, R . Tncouleur. The French Overseas Empire. London , 1978. Bley, H . South- West Afn·ca under German Rule 1894-1914. London, 197 1 .

Sources tion Polzcy. 2nd ed. London, 1 967. - West Africa under Colonial Rule. London, 1 968. - 'The 1914- 1 9 1 8 European War and West Africa.' in Ajayi, J.F.A. and Crowder, M. (eds) History of West Afnca, vol. II, London, 1974. Darwin, J. 'Imperialism in Decline? Trends in Brit­ ish Imperial Policy between the Wars.' The HistoricalJournal, vol. XXIII, 1 980. Davis, S.C. The French War Machine. London, 1937. la Documentation Internationale. La paix de Ver­ satlles. Questions mtlitaires et navales. Paris, 1939. Duff Cooper. Old Men Forget. London , 195 3 . Duiker, W.J. The Ri.Je of Nationalism in Vietnam, 1900-1941 . Ithaca, NY, 1976. Duroselle, J-B. La France et /es Franfais 1 914- 1 920. Paris, 1972. - La decadence, 1932-9. Paris, 1979. - 'Strategic and Economic Relations during the First World War.' in Waites, N. (ed.) Trou­ bled Neighbours: Franco-Bntish Relations in the Twentieth Century. London, 1 97 1 . Elcock, H . Portrait of a Decision. The Council of Four and the Treaty of Versailles. London, 1972. Evans, L. United States Policy and the Partition of Turkey, 1914-1924. Baltimore , 1 965. Ferry, A. Les carnets secrets d'Abel Ferry Israelite Universe/le et la renaissance juive 1914- 1918. Paris, 1957. 1860-1960. Paris, 1 965 . Fidel, C. La paix coloniale franfai.Je. Paris, 1 9 1 8 . Churchill, W.S. The World Crisis. London, 1968 Fischer, F . Germany 's Aims in the First World ed . War. London , 1 967 . Cohen, W.B. Rulers of Empire: The French Col­ Flandin, E. Rapport sur la Syrie et la Palestine. onial Service in Afnca. Stanford, 1 97 1 . Paris, 1 9 1 5 . Comite de Defense des lnterers Fran�ais en Ori­ Friedman, I . The Question ofPalestine 1914-1918. ent. Rapport sur un voyage d'etude ii Constan­ London, 1 97 3 . tinople, en Egypte et en Turquie d'Asie (janvier­ Ganiage, J. L 'expansion coloniale de la France sous aout 1912) par Maunce Pernot. Paris, 1914 . la Troisieme Republique 1871-1914. Paris, 1 968. Comite d'Etudes. Travaux du Comite d'Etudes. Gann, L.H. and Duignan, P. The Rulers of Ger­ 2 vols, Paris , 1919. man Afnca, 1884-1914. Stanford, 1977. Confer, V . France and Algeria: the Problem of de Gaulle , C. Memoires de guerre. 3 vols, Paris, Civil Reform 1870- 1920. Syracuse, NY, 1 966. 1954-9. Congres d'Agriculture Coloniale. Compte-rendu - Memoires d'espotr. 2 vols, Paris, 1970- 1 . des travaux. Vol. I (Rapport general par M. du Georges-Picot, G . 'La France et )'Empire Ottoman. Vivier de Streel). Paris, 1920. De l'integrite au partage { 1914-19 16).' Un­ Coquery-Vidrovitch, C. 'L'impact des interets col­ published maitrise d'histoire, Paris I, 1977. oniaux: S.C.O.A. et C.F.A.O. clans l'Ouest Afri­ Gilbert, M. Exile and Return. The Emergence of cain, 1910-1965.'Journal ofAfncan Hi.Jtory, vol. Jewish Statehood. London, 1978. XVI, 197 5 . - Winston S. Churchill. Vol. III, London, Crowder, M . Senegal: a Study of French Assimtla197 1 .

Bowle, J. Viscount Samuel: a Biography. London, 1957. Bruguiere, M . 'Le chemin de fer de Yunnan. Paul Doumer et la politique d'intervention fran�aise en Chine ( 1 899- 1902 ) . ' Revue d'Histoire Diplomatique, vol. LXXVII, 1963. Brunschwig, H. French Colonialism, 1871- 1914: Myths and Realities. London, 1 966. Burnett, R. 'Georges Clemenceau in the Paris Peace Conference, 1919.' Unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of Nonh Carolina, 1968. Buttinger, J. Vietnam: a Dragon Embattled. Vol. I, London, 1967. Cambon, J. The Diplomat. London, 1 93 1 . Cambon. P . [Cambon , H. (ed .)] Correspondance, 1870-1 924, 3 vols, Paris, 1940-6. Cassar, G.H. The French and the Dardanelles. London, 1 97 1 . Catala, R . 'La question de l'echange de la Gambie britannique contre Jes comptoirs fran�ais du Golfe de Guinee. ' Revue d'Histoire des Colonies, vol. XXXV, 1948 . Charles-Roux, F. Souvenirs diplomatiques d'un age revolu. Paris, 1956. Charmetant , Monsignor F. Lettre ouverte a nos hommes d'etat. Paris, 1 9 1 5 . Chevallier, D. 'Lyon et la Syrie en 1 9 1 9 : Jes bases d'une intervention.' Revue Histonque, vol . CCXXIV, 1960. Chouraqui , A.N. Cent ans d'histoire: /'Alliance

Sources Girardet , R . L 'idee coloniale en France de 1871 ii 1 962. Paris, 197 2 . - 'L'apotheose de la "Plus Grande France" : l'idee coloniale devant !'opinion fran�aise ( 1930- 193 5 ) . ' Revue Franfaise de Science Politique, vol. XVIII, 1 968. Grafftey-Smith, L. Bnght Levant. London, 1970. Grey of Fallodon. Twenty-Five Years 1892-1916. 2 vols, London, 192 5 . Grimal , H . Decolonization. London, 1978. Grupp, P . 'Le "parti colonial" frani;ais pendant la Premiere Guerre Mondiale. Deux tentatives de programme commun.' Cahiers d'Etudes Afn·­ caines, vol. XIV, 2 , 1974. Guignard , A. 'Les troupes noires pendant la guerre. ' Revue des Deux MondeJ, 15 June 1 9 19. Haddad, W.W., and Ochsenwald , W.L. (eds) Na­ tionalism in a Non-National State. Columbus, Ohio, 1977. H all, H . H. 'The Eastern Question in Anglo­ French Relations, 1920- 1 92 2 . ' Unpublished Ph . D . thesis , Vanderbilt University, 197 1 . Hankey, M . The Supreme Command, 1914-1 918. London, 1 96 1 . - The Supreme Control at the Paris Peace Con­ ference 1919. London, 1 963. Hanotaux, G. and Martineau, A. (eds) Histoire generale des colonies franfaises. 6 vols, Paris, 1929-34 . Hargreaves, J . D . Prelude to the Partition of West Afn'ca. London, 1963. Haywood, A. and Clarke, F.A.S. The History of the Royal West Afn'can Frontier Force. Alder­ shot, 1964. Heisser, D.C.R. 'The Impact of the Great War on French Imperialism , 1914- 1924. ' Unpublish­ ed Ph . D . thesis, University of North Carolina, 1 972 . Helmreich, P.C. From Pans to Sevres. Columbus, Ohio, 1974. Henry, P. 'L'opinion publique frani;aise et le probleme colonial. ' Sondages, Aug. 1939. Hinsley, F.H. (ed . ) Bntish Foreign Poli'cy under Sir Edward Grey. Cambridge, 1977. Hornberg, 0 . Les coulisses de l'histoire: souvenirs, 1898-1928. Paris, 1938. Hourani, A.H. Syna .and Lebanon: a Political Essay. London , 1946. Howard, M. The Continental Commitment. Lon­ don , 1972. Ismail, M . 'Le Liban sous Jes Mutassarifs: situa­ tion interieure et politique internationale

( 1 86 1 - 19 14).' Unpublished dissertation, Paris, 1978. Jeffrey, K.H. 'The Military Defence of the British Empire, 19 18- 1920.' Unpublished Ph .D. thesis, Cambridge, 1978. - 'Sir Henry Wilson and the Defence of the British Empire .' journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, vol. V, 1976. Johnson, G.W. Jr The Emergence of Black Pol­

itics in Senegal. The Struggle for Power in the Four Communes, 1900- 1920. Stanford, 1 9 7 1 . Kanya-Forstner, A . S . The Conquest ofthe Western Sudan: a Study in French Military Imperialism.

Cambridge, 1969. Kaspi, A . Le temps des Amencains. Paris, 1976. Kedourie, E. England and the Middle F.ast: the

destruction of the Ottoman Empire 1914-1921.

2nd ed. Hassocks, 1978. - In the Anglo-Arab Labyn·nth: The McMahon­

Husayn CoTTespondence and tis Interpretations, 1914- 1 939. Cambridge, 1976.

- 'Sir Mark Sykes and Palestine 191 5-1916.' Middle Eastern Studies, 1970. Keynes , J . M . Essays in Biography. 2nd ed . London, 195 1 . Kirkpatrick, Sir I . The Inner Circle. London , 1959. Laroche, J. Au quai d'Orsay avec Briand et Poin­ care, 1914-1926. Paris, 1957. Lawrence, T.E. Seven Ptllars of Wisdom. London, 1973 ed. Legum, C. Pan Afncanism: a Short Political Guide. 2nd ed . New York, 1965 . Levigne, C. 'Le mouvement sioniste en France et la politique fran�aise au Levant 1900- 1920.' Rela­ tions Internationales, vol. IV, 1977. Liddell Hart, B.H. 'T.E. Lawrence ' in Arabia and After. Revised ed. London, 1935 . Lloyd George, D. The Truth about the Peace Treaties. 2 vols, London , 1938 . - The War Memoirs, 2 vols, London , 1936 ed . Loheac, L. 'Le Llban a la Conference de la Paix, 19 19-20.' Unpublished maitrise d'histoire, Paris­ Nanterre, 1972. Longrigg, S.H. Syria and Lebanon under French Mandate. London , 1958. Lorin, H. La France, puissance coloniale. Paris, 1906 . Loubere, A. 'Les idees de Louis Blanc sur le na­ tionalisme, le colonialisme et la guerre. ' Revue d'Hzstoire Moderne et Contemporaine, vol. IV , 1957. Louis, W.R. Great Britain and Germany 's Lost Col-

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onies 1914-1919. Oxford , 1967. - 'The United States and the African Peace Set­ tlement of 1919: The Pilgrimage of George Louis Beer. ' ]ournal of Afn'can History, vol. IV, 1963 . Lyautey, P. (ed . ) Lyautey l'Afncain, textes et lettres. 3 vols, Paris, 1953-8. MacMunn, Lt. -Gen. Sir G. and Falls , Capt. C. Military Operations in Egypt and Palestine from the Outbreak of War with Germany to June 191 7. London , 1928.

Mahafzah , A . 'La France et le mouvement national­ iste arabe de 1914 a 1950.' Relations lntema­ tionales, vol. VI, 1 979. Mansfield, P. The Arabs. London , 1976. Mantoux, P. Les deliberations du Conseil des Quatre. 2 voh, Paris, 195 5 . Marseille, J. 'L'investissement fran!;ais clans !'em­ pire !olonial. L'enquete du gouvernement de Vichy ( 1943).' Revue Histon·que, vol . CCLII, 1974. Meinenzhagen, R. Middle Eastern Diary 191 7-56. London , 1959. Messimy, A. Mes Souvenirs. Paris , ( 1 937]. Michel, M. 'Le concours de l'A.O.F. a la France pendant la premiere Guerre mondiale. ' Un­ published doctorat d'etat, Paris, 1979. - 'Citoyennete et service militaire clans Jes quatre communes du Senegal au cours de la premiere Guerre mondiale ,' in Perspective nouvelles sur le

passe de l'Afnque noire et de Madagascar. Melanges offerts a Hubert Deschamps. Paris ,

1976. - 'La genese du recrutement de 1 9 18 en Afrique noire fran(.:aise .' Revue Franfaise d'Histoire d'Outre-Mer, vol. LVIII, 1 97 1 . - 'Le recrutement des tirailleurs en A . O .F. pen­ dant la premiere Guerre mondiale. Essai de bilan statistique.' Revue Franfaise d'Histoire d'Outre­ Mer, vol. LX, 1973. - 'Un mythe: la "Force Noire" avant 1914.' Rela­ tions lnternationales, vol . I , 1 974. Mickelsen , M .L. 'Another Fashoda: The Anglo­ Free French Conflict over the Levant , May­ September 1941 . ' Revue Franfaise d'Histoire d'Outre-Mer, vol. LXIII, 1 976. Miller, D .J . 'Stephen Pichon (1 857-1933) and the Making of French Foreign Policy (1 906- 1 9 1 1).' Unpublished Ph .D. thesis , Cambridge, 197 7 . Miller, J .L. 'The Syrian Revolt of 192 5 . ' Interna­ tionalJournal of Middle East Studies, vol. VIII , vol. 4, 1977. Miquel, P . La paix de Versailles et /'opinion pub-

Sources lique franfaise. Paris, 1972 . Mordacq , J .) . H . Le ministere Clemenceau. Journal d'un temoin. 4 vols, Paris, 1930- 1 . Morgenthau , R . S . Political Parties in French­ Speaking West Africa. Oxford, 1964 . Mouton, M . R . 'L'Algerie devant le parlement fran!;ais de 1935 a 1938.' Revue Franfaise de Science Politique, vol. XII , 1962 . Nelson, K.L. 'The "Black Horror on the Rhine": Race as a Factor in Post-World War I Diplomacy. ' Journal of Modem History, vol. XLI I , 1970. Nevakivi, J. Bn'tain, France and the Arab Middle East 1914-1920. London, 1969. - 'Lord Kitchener and the Partition of the Ot­ toman Empire, 19 1 5- 1 9 16 . ' in Bourne, K. and Watt, D.C. (eds) Studies in International History : Essays Presented to Professor W. Norton Medlicott. London, 1967 . Nicolson, H. Curzon, The Last Phase, 1919-1925.

London, 1 934. - Peacemaking 191 9. London, 194 5 . Oliphant, Sir L. An Ambassador in Bonds. Lon­ don, 1 947. Pierre-Alype, F . La provocation allemande aux colonies. Paris, 19 1 5 . Poincare , R. A u service de la France. 1 1 vols, Paris, 1928-74. Ponsonby, A . Falsehood in Wartime. London, 1928. Prevost-Parado! . M. La France nouvelle. 10th ed. Paris , 1 869. Redus, 0. Lachons l'Asie. Prenons l'Afnque. Paris, 1904. Regismanset, C. Questions coloniales, :ie sen·e {1912-1919). Paris, 192 3 . Regismanset, C. and d u Vivier d e Streel, E. (eds)

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Renouvin. P. 'Les buts d e guerre d u gouvernement fran!tais , 1 914- 1 9 1 8 . ' Revue Histon·que, vol. CCXXXV, 1966. Ribot, A . Lettres a un ami. Souvenirs de ma vie polt'tique. Paris, 1924. Ribot, A. (ed . ) Journal d'Alexandre Ribot et cor­ respondances inedt'ts 191 4-1922. Paris, 1936. Ristelhueber, R . Les tradi'tions franfaises au Liban. Paris, 192 5 . Robbins, K. Sir Edward Grey. London , 197 1 . Rober-Raynaud . Les relations franco-espagnoles et le Maroc. Paris, 1 9 1 7 . Robercs, S . H . History of French Colonial Policy 1870-1925. London, 1929.

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Robiquet, P. (ed . ) Discours et opinions de Jules Ferry. 7 vols, Paris, 1 893-8. Roskill, S.W. Hankey, Man ofSecrets. 3 vols, Lon­ don , 1 970-4 . Rothwell , V . H. Bntish WarAims andPeace Diplo­ macy, 1914-1918. Oxford, 197 1 . - 'The British Government and Japanese Mili­ tary Assistance, 1914- 19 1 8 . ' History, vol. LVI, no. 1 86, 1 97 1 . Royal Institute of International Affairs , Informa­ tion Department Paper no . 2 5 , The French Col­ onial Empire. London , 1940. Said, E.W. on·entalism. London , 1978. Comte de Saint-Aulaire. Confessions d'un vieux diplomate. Paris, 1 9 5 3 . Samne, G. La question syn·enne. Paris, [ 19 1 9 ? ) . - La Syne. Paris, 1920. Viscount Samuel, Memoirs. London , 194 5 . Sarraut , A. Grandeur et servitude coloniales. Paris, 193 1 . - La mi.re en valeur des colonies franyai.res. Faris, 192 3 . Sauvy, A . Histoire economique de la France entre /es deux gue"es. 3 vols, Paris, 1 965. Scherer, A. and Grunewald, J. (eds) L 'Allemagne

et /es problemes de la paix pendant la premiere gue"e mondiale. 2 vols, Paris, 1962-6. Schmidt , M .E. Alexandre Ribot: Odyssey ofa Lib­ eral in the Third Republic. The Hague, 1974.

Semidei, M. 'De l'empire ii la decolonisation a travers Jes manuels scolaires fran�ais.' Revue Franyatse de Science Politique, vol. XVI, 1966. Seton-Watson, C. Italy from Liberalism to Fascism 1870- 1925. London, 1968. Seymour, C . M . (ed . ) The Intimate Papers of Col­ onel House. 4 vols, London, 1926-8 . Shaw, S.J. and Shaw, E.K. History of the Otto­ man Empire and Modern Turkey. Vol. II, Cam­ bridge, 1977. Shotwell , J . T. At the Pans Peace Conference. New York, 1937. Shorrock, W.I. French Impenalism in the Middle East. London , 1976. Smith, C.J. Jc The Ruman Struggle for Power, 1914- 191 7. New York, 1956. Sonyel, S.R. Turkish Diplomacy 1918-1923. Lon­ don , 1 97 5 . Soutou, G-H. 'La Fran�e e t Jes marches de I'Est, 1914- 19 18. ' Revue Histonque, Vol. CCLX, 1978. ,pagnolo , J . P. France and Ottoman Lebanon 1861 - 1 914. London, 1977.

2.61 Spire, A. Souvenirs a batons rompus. Paris, 1962. Spitzer, A . B . The Revolutionary Theories of Louis Auguste Blanqui. New York, 1957. Steed, H . W. Through Thirty Years, 1892-1922. 2 vols, London, 1924. Stein, L. The Balfour Declaration. London, 196 1 . Stevenson, D . 'French War Aims Against Germany 1914- 1 9 1 8 . ' Unpublished Ph .D. thesis , Cam­ bridge, 1978. Summers, A. and Johnson , R.W. 'World War I, Conscription and Social Change in Guinea. 'Jour­ nal of Afn·can History, vol. XlX, 1978. Tanenbaum, J.K. 'France and the Arab Middle East, 19 14- 1920.' Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, vol. LXVIII , 1978. - General Maunce Sa"ail, 1856 -1929. Chapel Hill , North Carolina, 1974. Tardieu , A. La paix. Paris, 192 1 . Taylor, A .J P. The Struggle for Mastery in Europe, 1848-1 918. Oxford , 1954. Thobie, J. 'Les incerecs economiques, financiers et politiques fran�ais clans la partie asiatique de !'Empire Ottoman de 1895 a 1 9 14 . ' Unpublished doctorat d'etat, Paris, 1973. (Published in ab­ breviated form as Interets et imperialisme franyais dans /'Empire Ottoman. Paris, 1978.) Thornton, A.P. Impenalism in the Twentieth Cen­ tury. London, 1978. Trachtenberg, M . 'A New Economic Order: Etienne Clementel and French Economic Diplomacy during the First World War . ' French Histoncal Studies, vol. X, 1977. Varet, P. Du concours apporte a la France par ses

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Abbreviations

AE AN ANSOM BAN BCAF BCAs. F BN BS CAB

co

CP DBFP DC EMA FO FRUS

Archives du Ministcre des Affairs Etrangeres Archives NationaJc:s Archives NationaJc:s (Section Outrc:­ Mc:r) Bibliothequc: de: I' Assc:mblec: Na­ tionale Bulletin du Comite de l'Afnque Fran­ fatse, later L'Afrique Franfazse Bulletin du Comite de l'Asie Fran­ raise, later L 'Asie Franfazse Bibliotheque Nationale Bibliotheque du Senat Cabinet Papers Co"espondance d'On·e nl Confidential Print Documents on British Foreign Policy, 1919-1939, first sc:ric:s (London, 1947- ) La Depeche Coloniale Etat-Major de: I' Armee Foreign Office Papers Papers Relating to the Foreign Rela­ tions of the United States. The Pans Peace Conference 1919 (Washington 1942-7)

Bibliothequc: de: l'Institut de France: India Office: Library journal Ofjiciel de la Republique Franfazse, Debats Parlementaires (Chambre des Deputes) jODoc.PC journal Ofjiciel de la Republtque Franfazse, Documents Parlementaires (Chambre des Deputes) Ministcre dc:s A.ffaires Etrangcrc:s MAE Ministcre dc:s Colonies MC Ministere de: la Guerre: MG 00 Oeuvre des Eco/es d'Orient pp Parliamentary Papers PRO Public Road Office:, Kc:w SG Archives de: la Societe de: Geographic:, Bibliotheque NationaJc: (depanc:mc:nt des canes c:t plans) SHA Service Historiquc: de: I'Armec: SHA SOM Service: Historiquc: de l'Armec: (Section Outrc:-Mer) UL Cambridge University Library

IF IL jODPC

Notes to the Text

r:'he amzngement of notes \.rchival references appear thus: \.uthor, subject, date, dossier; author, subject, late, dossier . . .

;everal documents from one dossier appear thus: \.uthor, subject, date, author, subject, date: lossier; author . . .

1ublications are detailed in the list of sources, pp. : 54-62.

'reface

Brunschwig, French Colonialism; Gani age, L 'ex­ •ansion coloniale. : Ageron, France coloniale. , Girardet, L 'idee coloniale, p . 9 5 . ; Kirkpatrick, The Inner Circle, p . 40.

:hapter One

Berard, L 'Anglete"e et l'imperialisme, p . 99. Taylor, The Struggle for Mastery in Europe, p . 5 ; Jules Ferry, preface to Les affaires de Tunisie, 1 Robiquet (ed . ),Jules Ferry, V, p . 522; Girardet, 'idee coloniale, chap. 3 . Cited b y Yacono, La colonisationfranfaise, p. 47. )n the French marines in West Africa see Kanya­ orstner, The Conquest of the Western Sudan. Jules Ferry, preface to Tonkin et la merepatne, in obiquet (ed.), Jules Ferry, V, p. 5 5 5 ; speech by .renberg on retirement as president of the Comite e l'Afa'que Franfaise, BCAF, Jan. 1 9 1 3 . Minutes o f foreign affairs commission of the hamber, 2 5 Sept. 1918, AN C 7491. Andrew and Kanya-Forstner, The French "Col­ t1ial Party" '; Andrew, Delcasse, chaps 2 , 10.

7 Ageron, Les Algen·ens musulmans, II, chap. 38; Michel, 'Un mythe: la "Force Noire" avant 1914'; Jeffrey, The Military Defence of the British Empire 1918- 1920', chap. 1 . 8 Andrew and Kanya-Forstner, 'French Business and the French Colonialists'. 9 DC, 1 July 1913 , 2 June 1914; Fidel, La paix col­ oniale franfaise, p . 6. 10 M. Rondet-Saint, 'Epitre aux coloniaux', Mer et Colonies, March 1937. 11 Repon by Paul Laffont, JODoc. PC, 1920, no. 807, p. 1099 (includes quotation from Messimy). 12 Messimy, Souvenirs, pp. 40- 1 ; Cohen, Rulers of Empire, p. 59. 13 Cohen, Rulers of Empire, pp. 34 ff; Hanotaux and Manineau (eds) Histoire generale, V, pp . 507 ff; Sarraut, Grandeur et servitude coloniales, p. 2 10. 14 'Le budget colonial de 1920', ANSOM 2641 AP 17. 1 5 Association des fonctionnaires civils de l'ad­ ministration centrale du ministere des colonies to Messimy, 30 March 191 1 , ANSOM 2 5 16 AP 10; G. Candace, Proposition de resolution relative a la reorganisation des services du ministere des col­ onies, JODoc.PC, 1 1 Feb. 1916, no. 1 784; G. Boussenot, Rappon fait au nom de la commission des affaires exterieures et coloniales chargee d'ex­ aminer la proposition de resolution de M. Candace . . . , zbid. , 1 1 July 1916, no. 2333 (emphasis in original). Colin's career may be followed in the An­ nuaire du Ministere des Colonies. 16 See below, pp . 1 3 1 , 143. 1 7 Andrew, Delcasse, chap. 13; Allain, Agadir 191 1 , pp . 227-3 1 , 254-5. 1 8 Andrew and Kanya-Forstner, 'Gabriel Hanotaux'.

Notes to the Text ing 00, Jan.-Feb. 1 9 1 2 . The Oeuvre des Eco/es 19 Allain's otherwise valuable study, Agadir, d'On"ent was sometimes called simply the Oeuvre underestimates the influence of the colonialists in the preparation of the march on Fez. It does not ex­ d'On"ent. amine the links between important figures such as 30 Andrew and Kanya-Forstner, The French "Col­ General Toutee (Lyautey's more adventurous suc­ onial Party" ' , pp. 105-6. The membership of the cessor on the Moroccan border) and the colonialist section du Levant of the Comite de l'Asie Franyaise movement. Nor does it consider the evidence of is given in BCAs. F, Nov. 1909 . collusion between colonialists and the Algerian 31 Andrew, Delcasse, passim. military in the Terrier MSS (IF) and the Jules Cam­ 32 D.]. Miller, 'Stephen Pichon', chaps 5 , 6. bon MSS (AE). This evidence is, not surprisingly, 33 Hornberg, Les coulisses de l'histoire, p . 94; fragmentary : the full details of collusion are rarely Messimy, Souvenirs, p. 39; BCAF, Nov. 1906. committed to paper. But it is clear both that 34]0DPC, 10 Mar. 1914. Toutee discussed his plan of action with colonialist 35 Andrew, The French Colonialist Movement' , p . leaders and that Pichon during his final months in 150. office feared the hatching of a plot for a Moroccan 36 Andre� and Kanya-Forstner, The French "Col­ 'adventure' by 'thr. soldiers and the parti colonial' . onial Party" ', pp. 99- 1 0 1 . Andrew, Delcasse, pp . 32-4. See the revised version of Andrew and Kanya­ 37 Andrew and Kanya-Forstner, The French "Col­ Forstner ,' The French "Colonial Party" ' , pp . 49-50. Other references to this article are to the original onial Party" ' , pp. 125-6; Ageron , Les A/gen.ens musulmans, II, pp. 1 103 ff. ; Andrew, Grupp and version. 20 On the organization and membership of the Kanya-Forstner, 'Le mouvement colonial', p. 648. par# colonial see especially Andrew, Grupp and 38 Picot to Sykes, 1 1 Sept. 1918, PRO FO 800 / 2 2 1 Kanya-Forstner, 'Le mouvement colonial' . The se­ Sykes MSS. cond annex to this article provides brief career sum­ maries for most of the colonialists mentioned in Chapter Two this book, as well as details of the colonialist 1 Andrew and Kanya-Forstner, The French "Col­ societies to which they belonged. On the col­ onialists in parliament see also Andrew and Kanya­ onial Party" ', pp. 1 17 ff. From 1 893 to 1904 France also occupied the Siamese port of Chantabun. Forstner, 'The groupe colonial'. 2 lbid. ; Bruguiere, 'Le chemin de fer du Yunnan' , 21 Andrew and Kanya-Forstner, The French "Col­ onial Party" ' . Ageron, France coloniale, reaches pp. 3 5 ff ; Ageron, France coloniale, p . 139; Beloff, broadly similar conclusions on the pre-war in­ Imperial Sunset, I, p . 49. fluence of the parti colonial but does not examine 3 De Caix, 'Les interets fran�ais en Chine', BCAs.F, its wartime role. May 1903 . 22 Speech by Etienne reported in BCAF, June . 4 Andrew and Kanya-Forstner, The French "Col­ 1902. onial Party'" , pp. 1 18 ff; Redus, Lachons 23 DC, 1 8 Sept. 1902 ; Andrew, Grupp and Kanya­ l'Ast"e.Prenons l'Afnque, pp . 29-32. Forstner, 'Le mouvement colonial' . 5 Andrew and Kanya-Forstner, The French "Col­ 24 Speech by Etienne reported in BCAF, 1910, onial Party" ' , p. 1 20 . supplement 3 ; Prevost-Parado!, La France nouvelle, 6 Ib1d. 7 Crowder, West Africa, pp . 260- 3 . pp. 37 3-4 19; Brunschwig, French Colonialism, p. 5 7 ; Ageron, 'Gambetta'; Ganiage, L 'expansion col­ 8 A . Terrier, 'L'A.O . F . et l a convention d u 8 avril', BCAF, May 1904; Roume, 'Considerations sur un oniale, chap. 3. 25 Loubere, 'Les idees de Louis Blanc', pp . 50 ff . echange eventuel des droits de la France aux 2 6 Spitzer, The Revolutionary Theon·es of Louis Nouvelles-Hebrides contre la cession de la Gambie Auguste Blanqui, p. 1 1 8 . anglaise' , 17 Oct. 1906, AE Grande Bretagne NS 2 7 BCAF, Jan. 1904 , Dec. 1909. 2 3 . For earlier attempts to acquire the Gambia, see: 28 Office holders in the Alliance Franfaise are Catala, 'La question de l'echange de la Gambie', listed in the Bulletin de /'Alliance Franfaise. pp . 1 14-37; Hargreaves, Prelude to the Partition of 29 Charmetant, Lettre ouverte; 'Notice sur West Afnca, pp . 125-8 , 1 36-9 5 . !'Oeuvre des Ecoles d'Orient' , preface to 00 1 9 10; 9 Details of these abortive negotiations are t o be 'Aux lecteurs de ce bulletin', pamphlet accompany- found in AE Grande Bretagne NS 2 3 , 24.

Notes to the Text 10 Roberts, History ofFrench Colonial Policy, pp . 5 3 3 ff. 1 1 Allain, Agadir, chap. 14; A. Terrier, 'Nos aban­ dons au Congo fran�ais', BCAF, Sept. 191 1 . 1 2 De Caix, 'La ran�on du Maroc', BCAF, October 191 1 ; 'Les accords franco-allemands', 'L'appel du Maroc', BCAF, Nov. 191 1 , Jan. 1 9 1 2 ; Quinzaine Coloniale, 1 0 Nov. 191 1 . 1 3 Andrew, Delcasse, p . 106 . 14 Note, 29 Jan. 1 9 1 5 , Delcasse to Paul Cambon, 29 Jan. 19 1 5 : AE Maroc NS 120. 15 Charles-Roux, Souvenirs, p . 257; Curzon to Crewe, 27 Feb. 1 92 3 , UL Crewe MSS C / 1 2 . 1 6 Geoffray to Viviani, 2 3 June 1914, AE Maroc NS 1 19. 1 7 Paul Cambon to Geoffray, 1 8 july 1914, ibid. 1 8 See , especially, the thesis ofJ . Thobie published in abbreviated form as Interets et imperialisme franfais dans /'Empire Ottoman. Professor Thobie provides an exhaustive analysis of French financial and economic interests in Turkey-in-Asia. His thesis, however, is much weaker on the political side. Its 2000 pages contain no reference, for exam­ ple , to Etienne Flandin, the leading wartime cam­ paigner for a Syrian protectorate (an omission prob­ ably to be explained by Flandin's lack of association with the business interests which preoccupy Pro­ fessor Thobie). 19 R. de Caix, 'La crise orientale' , BCAs.F, Dec. 1 9 1 2 ; Hanotaux and Martineau (eds), Histoire generale, I, pp . xvi-xvii. 20 Ristelhueber, Les traditions franfaises au Liban. 2 1 J . Cambon, The Diplomat, pp. 90- 1 ; Barres, Enquete, I, pp . 70, 309, II, p. 2 0 1 ; Comite de Defense des Interets Fran�ais en Orient, Rapport par Maurice Pernot, p. 1 7 . Estimates of the numbers of pupils at French schools in the Ot­ toman Empire varied. Pemot (Rapport, pp . 3 10-39) put the total at 88 ,000; the Quai d'Orsay's commission des affaires syn·ennes arrived at a figure of 72 ,000. (Note de la commission des affaires syriennes, 3 Mar. 1913 , AE Turquie NS 120). Most other estimates were in this range. 22 Said , Onentalism, passim; Barres, Enquete, I, p . 144; Mansfield, The Arabs, pp . 1 19-20. 23 Said, on·entalism, p. 206; Shorrock, French Im­ perialism p . 4 1 ; Barre�, Enquete, II, pp. 1 8 5 , 200. 24 Lorin, La France, puissance coloniale, pp . 467-8; Thobie, 'Interets fran�ais', pp. 1 143-66. 25 R. de Caix, 'La question du chemin de fer de Bagdad', BCAs. F, Feb. 1907; Thobie, 'Interets fran�ais', p . 966.

2.6 5 26 Andrew, Delcasse, pp . 84-6; Shorrock, French Impenalism, chaps. 4 , 5 ; ]ODPC, 1 1 Mar. 1914; Barres, Enquete, II, pp. 183-4.

27 Paul Cambon to Poincare, 26 Nov. 1912 (with minute by Poincare noting his agreement), AE Turquie NS 1 1 7 . 2 8 Thobie , 'Interets fran�ais', p p . 1240-3 ; 'Les chemins de fer de !'Empire Ottoman et !es puissances' , BCAs.F, Feb. 191 1 ; Shorrock, French Impenalism, p. 1 5 3 . 29 Haddad, 'Nationalism i n the Ottoman Empire' , i n Haddad and Ochsenwald (eds) , Nationalism; Khalidi, 'Arab Nationalism in Syria: the Formative Years, 1908- 1914', ibid. 30 'Lettre de Beyrouth', BCAs.F, Jan. 191 1 ; 'Le­ vant: !'esprit nouveau en Syrie' , BCAs.F, April 191 1 . 3 1 00, 191 1 , p . 108; 'La Faculte de Medecine Fran�aise a Beyrouth' , BCAs.F, April 191 1 ; Comite de Defense des Interets Fran�ais en Orient, Rap­ port, p. 224; 'Levant: Inauguration des nouveaux batiments de la Faculte de Medecine Fran�aise de Beyrouth' , BCAs.F, Nov. 1912. 32 Speech by Leygues, cited by Flandin, Rapport, p. 6. 33 Comite de Defense des Interets Fran�ais en Orient. Rapport, pp . i-ii (The Rapport also con­ tains a list of the Comites founder members); 'Le Comite', BCAs.F, June 1913. 3 4 CO, 1 Oct. 1908 , 16 Feb. 1913. 35 Membership lists of the Comite de /'Orient ap­ peared at intervals in CO. In 1898 Flandin had founded the Reunion des Etudes Algen·e nnes, to which Leygues also belonged. 36 Flandin , Rapport, pp . 15-16. See below, pp. 68-9. 37 CO, 1 Mar. 1 9 1 3 ; BCAs.F, June 1910, p. 286. 38 Antonius, The Arab Awakening, chap . 6 ; Shor­ rock, French Imperialism, p. 47. 39 Shorrock , French Imperialism, pp . 109- 1 3 ; Spagnolo, France and Ottoman Lebanon, chap. 1 1 ; Ismail, 'Le Liban sous !es Mutassarifs', 3e partie, chaps 3, 4; 'Le Comite', BCAs.F, Feb. 1 9 1 3 . 40 Coulondre to Poincare, 1 1 Oct. 1912, AE Tur­ quie NS 1 1 7 ; Charmetant, 'Aux lecteurs de ce bulletin', pamphlet accompanying 00, Jan.-Feb. 1912 (emphasis in original). 41 Coulondre to Poincare, 1 1 Oct. 1912, Poincare to Defrance, 17 Nov. 1912: AE Turquie NS 1 1 7. 42 Defrance to Poincare, 12 Nov. 1 9 1 2 , Coulondre to Poincare, 12 Nov. 1 9 1 2 , Ganem to Poincare , 21 Nov. 1912, Gout , Note, 23 Nov. 19 1 2 , Bompard

Notes to the Text c Poincuf. 23 Xov 19i2· ibid. · Shorrock French Inzpru.· ,,,, chap 9. 43 _pecch ) PolOGI.Ce to C iii de l'Aiie e. BG .F. March 1 9 14 Fr;; 44 L. de Conccnson, 'En Turqu1e d'Asie' BC.Ar F, Jan 19' 3 R de uix, 'la crise orientale', BCA.r.F, Ott 1 12 Note de la commission dc:s affaires 120. STTJenncs 1 April 1 9 1 3 AE Turquie d1. 'Anh Nauonalism' in Haddad and 4 Ochsrnwald V.nio � ism pp . 2r 32 Spagnolo. . chap 1 2 · Amoruus A�b Au.uening, ub� fucthier . • 'otc (on mecung with pp i:-1 Gwcm) . r farch 1 9 1 3 AE Tu1qu1e r 'S 1 20; Degrand . • Tote pour le Duccteur a.s du Congres an.be". 12 June 191 3 AE TUiquic: . ' 122 46 'Le Congres Syrien Arabe de Paris'. BCAI F, June 1 9 1 3 'Le Comitc', ibid · Ristelhueber, 'Con­ ference du etc:. Cressary' 2 1 May 1 9 1 3 . AE Turquic: �S 1 2 1 Degrand • 'ote pour le: Duecteur a s . du Congres an.be', 1 : June 1 9 1 3 Ristelhuc:bcr, 'Le Con res men de Paris. Visttc: de M lime' 1 ]:me J J .._,, N

. "-, � ·

� A.

1 -,'-

H EJAZ

-'/.,,.

-i

I

Index

Abbas, Ferhat 247 Amery, Leo 34 Abd al-Krim 225 Amis de l'Onent 47; see also Abdullah, Emir 88 Comite de l'Onent Afrique Equaton'ale Franfaise Amis de la Te"e Sainte 220 (AEF) 37, 148, 193, 228, Ammun, lskandar 5 1 Angoulvant, Gabriel 242 237-8, 243-4 L 'Afn'que Franfaise: see Comite Ankara agreement ( 1921) 223 , de l'Afn'que Franfaise 231 Afrique Occidentale Franfaise Anna/es Coloniales 140 (AOF) 1 0- 1 1 , 14-16, 36-7 , anti-semitism 65 , 127-8, 220-1 60, 8 1-2 , 1 0 3 , 1 34-6, 139-42 , Antonetti, Raphael 244 147-9, 1 6 7 , 169-70, 228, 2 3 5 , Arab Congress (Paris, 1913) 237-8, 242-4 5 1-2 , 69 al-Ahd 88, 2 1 5 Arab Revolt 87-93, 102 , 1 10 , 1 12, 1 2 5 , 1 56, 161 Alawis 109 , 236 Alexandretta (Iskenderun) 68-9, Archinard, General Louis 27 Armand, comtc: 1 19 72, 88, 1 0 1 , 194 , 246 Armenia 100, 124 , 165 , 170- 1 , al-Faruqi 88 194, 197, 2 0 5 , 222 Al-Fatat 4 5 , 48, 88, 2 1 5 Alfonso XIII, King of Spain 79, army, French, in Africa 1 0- 1 3 , 22-3, 61-2 , 82, 97, 1 2 4 , 2 5 1 123, 1 5 1 , 174 (see also force noire); in Algeciras Act (1906) 38, 235 Middle East 1 1 , 40-1, 1 12 , Algeria, pre-war 9, 10, 1 3 , 1 59 ; 125-6, 1 52-3, 161-3, 176-7, during Great War 8 1-2, 9 1 , 186, 20 1-4 , 2 1 5-16, 2 1 8-19, 134-6, 1 3 8-9; post-war 35, 5 8 , 229-30, 232, 236, 239, 241-2 ; 168, 243-5 1 and war in Europe 5 5-6, 83-5, Allen by, General Sir Edmund 1 16-17, 137-8, 143 , 164, 191 124, 126 , 1 5 2 , 158, 160-1, Artaud, Adrien 160 , 2 1 1 189-90 Arwad 108, 1 1 1 Alliance Franfaise 27 Alliance Israelite Universe/le L 'A.ste Franfaise: see Comite de l'A.st"e Franfaise 127, 129, 220 Alliance Ltbanaise du Caire 178 Asquith, Herbert Henry 64-5 Allied M aritime Transport Association de l1ndustne et de /'Agriculture Franfaises 16-17, Council 142 147 Alsace-Lorraine 1 3 , 5 5, 5 7, 8 5, Audibert 146 1 17 , 1 19, 176

Augagneur, Victor 7 1-2 , 1 17 Australia 64 , 145, 1 6 1 , 182-3 Austria-Hungary 56, 79 Baghdad Railway 43, 5 2 , 94 Bailloud, General Maurice 126 Balfour, A . J . 42, 120, 130, 160, 163 , 172-3 , 177, 182, 187, 194 Balfour Declaration 1 30, 1 54, 217 Balkan Wars 49 Ballande, Andre 2 1 1 banks 1 4 , 16-17, 40, 42-3, 94, 226-7, 2 14 , 233-4, 248, 278 Banque de l'Indochine 14 Ban que de /'Union Pariszenne 248 Banque Industnelle de Chine 2 14, 233-4 Banque Ottomane 43 Barere, Bertrand 14 Barety, Leon 225 Barrere. Camille 200 Barres, Maurice 38, 4 1 , 43-4, 166, 209 Barthou, Louis 1 2 5 , 199 Batna rebellion 136 Bayhum, Ahmad 5 1-2 Beaumarchais, Caron de 2 14 Beer, G. L. 182-3 Bekir Sarni 223 Belgium 5 5 , 57, 58, 59, 63, 1 19, 170-1 Benjelloul, Ahmad 247 Benoist, Charles 86-7 Berenger, Henry 198, 205

Index Bernard , Augustin 103-4 Berteaux, Maurice 23 Benhelot, Philippe 28, 50, 66, 74 , 85, 90, 96, 1 16, 1 2 3 , 146, 160, 170-1 , 174, chap. 8 passim, 2 1 3-14, 230, 23 3-4, 239 Bertie, Sir Francis (later Lord) 58, 63 , 1 24, 1 3 7 Besnard , Rene 29, 144 Bethmann Hollweg, Theobald von 56 Binger, Louis-Gustave 27 Biqa valley 92, 1 6 1 , 205 , 229, 236 Blanc, Louis 26 Blanqui, Auguste 26 Bliss, Howard 1 78 , 188 Blum. Leon 24 5 Boer War 33 Bohn , Frederic 1 3 3 Boisneuf, Rene 2 1 3 , 227 Bompard, Maurice 5 3-4 , 66, 75, 77 Bonar Law, Andrew 98 Boppe, Auguste 53-4 Borgnis-Desbordes, General Gustave 35 Boselli, Paolo 122 Botha, Louis 63 Bourdarie , Paul 102 , 122 Bourde, Paul 38 Bourgeois, Leon 146 Bouteille, Desire 2 1 3 Boxer Rebellion 34 Brazza, Pierre Savorgnan de 2 3 Brea! , Auguste 1 2 3 Brenier, Henri 195 Bria n d , Aristide chap . 4 passim, 1 16- 18, 1 2 3 , 128, 206, 222, 225-6 Britain: see Great Britain British Empire, comparison with French 1 2-14, 18, 9 1 , 14 1 , 239, 243 , 246, 2 5 1 ; see also Great Britain British Palestine Committee 1 26 Bui Quang Chieu 247 Bunsen Committee 7 3, 94 , 96 Cabinet, and external policy 1 1-

1 2 , 1 7 , 28-9, 56-7, 70-4 , 84-7 , 96, 99, 1 1 9, 137, 146 , 165, 18 1 , 2 1 0, 2 1 3-14, 249 Cachin , Marcel 1 1 7 Cadman, Sir John 2 17 Caix, Robert de, and the parti colonial 28, 34, 46, 65 , 90, 100 , 104-6, 1 14, 149, 1 5 9 , 167-8 , 2 2 4 , 2 3 8 ; and official policy 28, 100, 106, 1 14, 147, 1 59, 167-8 , 1 70- 1 , 173. 188, 1 94-207 passim, 2 1 6-30 passim, 236, 2 38 Calthorpe, Admiral 163 Cambon, Jules 41, 85, 1 16, 122, 1 2 3 , 127-30, 181 Cambon, Paul 39, 44 , 67, 7 5 , 77, 83, 8 5 - 7 , 89, 9 3 , 96-101 , 1 10, 160, 1 7 2 , 1 94 Cameroons 37; allied conquest 61-2 ; wartime partition 97-9, 148; peace settlement and French mandate 182-3 , 232-3, 2 3 5 , 237 Candace, Gratien 1 84, 2 1 3 Cannes conference ( 1 922) 2 3 1 Caporetto 1 2 2 , 1 26 Catroux, General Georges 236, 24 1-2 Cecil, Lord Robert 160, 182 Chailley-Bert, Joseph 1 5 , 1 34 , 1 4 1 , 1 4 9 , 168 Chamberlain, Austen 1 93 Chamber of deputies : see foreign affairs commission, parliament Chambers of commerce 16, 76-7, 105, 147-8, 160, 167, 211 Chanak crisis 2 3 2 , 240 Charmetant, Mgr 2 7 , 49, 1 5 2 , 199. 2 1 7 Chateaubriand, Fran�ois Rene de 41 Cheikh Said 193 China 10, 22, 34, 104 Churchill, Winston S. 64 , 7 1 , 78, 241 Claude!, Paul 34, 1 56 Clayton, General Sir Gilbert 9 1 , 1 52

Clemenceau, Georges 8 3 , 1 20; and the Empire 10, 30, 78, 82, 1 36-9, 1 74-6, 237, 244; as prime m i n ister ( 1 9 1 7-20) chaps 6, 7, 8 passim Clementel, Etienne 14 3-4 codebreaking 79, 80 Colin, Eugene 2 1 colonial administration 19-2 1 , 8 1 , 1 3 1-4, 1 3 5-6, 140, 242-9 colonial exchanges, proposals for 24, 3 5-7, 62, 66, 76, 103-4, 1 19 , 144, 1 50 , 1 5 7 , 169-70, 2 30 colonial manpower 1 3 , 1 34-6, 1 38-4 1 , 163, 183-4, 1 9 1 , 2 1 0-1 1 , 23 7-8, 2 50 Colonial p a rt y : see parti

colonial

colonial trade, 14-17, 1 3 2-4, 141-3, 2 1 1- 1 3 , 226-8, 23 7-8 , 248 colons 18, 20, 3 1 , 8 2 , 1 3 9-40, 168, 244-6 Combes, Emile 1 2 , 4 3 , 83 Comile Arabo-Syn'en 69 Comite Central Sioniste 1 2 7 Comile Central Syn'en 1 30-1 , 1 5 6 , 1 6 1 , 1 77-8 , 187, 207 , 213

Comite d'Action Franfaise en Syrie 105-9, 1 1 1 , 1 14, 1 2 5 , 168

Comile d'Action Republicaine aux Colonies 7 1 C o m ite de Defense des Interets Franfais en on·ent 28, 46 , 50, 53, 1 2 1

Comite de l'Afrique Franfaise

24, 2 7 , 3 1 , 34 , 36, 58-9 , 62 , 8 1 , 99, 102-5 , 1 2 1 , 148-9, 167-9, 1 7 2 , 20 1 , 2 1 2 Comite de l'Asie Franfaise 24, 28, 34, 4 2 , 44-5 3 , 58-9, 69, 74, 76-7, 90, 102-5 , 1 14 , 1 2 1 , 1 5 7 , 1 59 , 167-8 , 199, 202 , 22 1-2 , 2 30 Comite de l'On'ent 28, 46, 50, 5 2 , 102 , 1 2 1 , 1 2 5 , 157, 199, 213

Comtte de propagande franfaise

Index aupres des ]uifs neutres 127 Comite des Forges 8 5 , 148 Comite d'etudes 86-7 , 165 Comite du Maroc 16-1 7 , 24, 3 1 , 79 Comite Dupleix 207 Comite France-Syrie 199 Comite France-Tanger 22 5-6 Comite Libanais de Pans 47-9, 69, 178 Comite lyonnais des interets franfais en Syrie 1 60 Comite National du Rail Afncain 143, 238 Comite parlementaire dizction ii l'etranger 147 , 1 5 6 C o m m ission Consultative Coloniale 132 Commission de documentation coloniale 2 2 , 144•-6 Co m m ission des etu des islamiques 19 C o m m issio n d'etude des questions coloniales posees par la guem 146-5 1 , 166, 168-9 Conference Coloniale ( 1 9 1 7 ) 133--4, 1 50 Congo, Belgian 16, 60, 63, 2 1 1 Congo, French 1 6 , 37-8, 149, 209, 2 1 2 , 238 Congo Reform Association 60 Congres d'Agnculture Coloniale 143 Congres Franfais de la Syn·e 167 Cooper, Sir Alfred Duff 242 Correspondance d'Onint 105 cotton 1 5 , 141-2, 228 Coulondre 49 Crane , C. R . 203 Crespi, Silvio 1 91-2 Cressaty, 'comte' 105 Crewe, Marquess of 160 La Croix 167 Crowe, Sir Eyre 185 Curzon, Viscount 39, 1 12-1 3 , 1 58 , 1 7 2 , 1 8 5 , 192, 199-200, 209, 23 1--4, 240-1 Cyprus 96 Daladier, Edouard 2 50

Dardanelles expedition 68, 7 1 --4 , 134 decolonization 242-7 , 2 50-1 Defrance, Albert 66-8 , 89 , 100, 1 12 , 1 53 Delcasse, Theophile 23, 28, 30, 3 5 , 57-8 , 66-79 passim, 146 Deloncle, Jean-Louis 27 La Depeche Coloniale 16, 2 5 , 140, 2 1 2 , 2 1 3 Derby, Earl of 160, 1 8 5 , 189, 201 , 204, 207 , 209, 2 14 Dernburg, Bernhard 59 Deroulede , Paul 1 3 , 30, 5 5 Deschanel, Paul 208, 2 1 3 Descoins, Colonel 69 Detachement Franfais en Palestine 1 12, 126, 1 52-3 Deutsche Bank 43 Diagne , Blaise , 8 1 , 1 3 5 , i 39--40, 184 , 243 Dobell, General 62 Doumer, Paul 20, 22 Doumergu e , Gaston 1 3 3 ; background 28-9; as colonial minister 28-9, 60-3, 86, 97-9, 1 13 , 1 17- 18; as foreign min­ ister 50, 56-6 1 ; and commis­ sion d'etude 146-5 1 , 168-9 Druzes 236, 245 Du Bois, W.E.B. 184 Duchene, Albert 6 1 , 144-6, 169, 184-5 Dutasta, Paul 181 Eastern Committee 1 5 8-9, 172 L 'Echo de Paris 2 14 Ecole Coloniale 19 Edde, Antoine 108-9, 1 1 1 Egy pt 1 1 , 49, 66-8, 7 7 , 87-9 1 , 1 10, 125, 200, 243 'Egyptian party' 7 7 , 87, 90, 1 10, 1 14 Entente Cordiale 24, 34, 36-7, 38, 56 Enver Pasha 64 Ethiopia 13 7 Etienne, Eugene 24-5 , 28, 3 1 , 33--4, 69, 12 1 , 122, 1 3 2 , 146-5 1 , 165 , 168, 2 10 Etoile Nord-Afn'caine 246-7

Faculte Franfaise de Medecine (Beirut) 46, 160 Faisal , Emir (later King ) , during war 8 8 , 1 1 2 , 1 56, 161-2 ; post-war conflict with France 173, 177-9, 186, 1889, 194-6, 201-6, 2 1 5-2 3, 229 Falkenhayn, General Erich von 84 Fashoda crisis 1 1-12 , 2 3 , 24, 95, 2 3 1 , 242 Fauchere, Aime 134, 140 Federation des Elus Musulmans 247 Ferhat Abbas 247 Ferry, Jules 10-1 1 , 1 7 , 24-6, 30, 137, 240 Fez expedition ( 19 1 1 ) 12, 22, 264 Fidel, Camille 103 , 1 13-14, 1 2 1 , 147 , 150, 166-7, 209 Fighiera 14 7 Flandin, Etienne 47, 5 2 , 66 , 69, 75-6, 100, 105-9, 114 , 1 2 1 , 124-5 , 138-9 , 143 , 1 5 7 , 1 59-6 1 , 168, 265 , 267 Fleuriau, Aime de 1 34, 139 Foch, Marshal Ferdinand 125 , 181 force noire 13, 134-6, 138--4 1 , 163, 183--4, 1 9 1 , 2 10-11 foreign affairs commission (Chamber of Deputies) 76, 82, 146, 1 59, 164 , 199, 221, 229; (Senate) 82, 146, 1 59, 230 Forster, W. E. 13 Fournol, Etienne 147 Fourteen Points 146, 149, 157 Franklin-Bouillon, Henri 146, 1 59, 167, 199, 223 French language 26-7 , 4 1 , 45-6, 5 1 , 65, 7 5 , 170-1 , 238 Freycinet, Charles de 83 , 143 Gambetta, Leon, 24-5 , 30, 43, 249, 251 Gambia, The, French designs on 36, 103, 145, 1 50, 169, 173, 193 Ganem, Shukri 47-8 , 69, 105 , 130, 178, 187-8, 207

Index Garnier, Francis 23 Gasparri , Cardinal 1 5 5 Gaster, Rabbi Dr Moses 128-9 Gaulle, Charles de 35, 241-2, 250 Gauvain, Auguste 194-5 Geoffray 123 Georges-Picot, Charles 66 Georges-Picot, Fran�ois 5 8 ; background 8 , 66; and parti colonial 28, 32, 66, 74, 90, 978, 1 58; consul-general in Beirut 52-3, 66-8; and Sykes­ Picot negotiations 74-5, 8997, 100-2; and German West Africa 97-9; and Zionists 1 289, 1 54; calls for military intervention in Syria 67-9, 1 1 1-12, 1 2 5 , 1 53; as haut commissaire 1 52-6 1 , 176-9 German East Africa 62-3 , 98-9 German South-West Africa 63 German West Africa: see Cameroons, Togo Ger m a n y , a n d pre -war Moroccan crisis 30-1 , 46; and Ottoman Empire 43-4, 49-52, 64-5, 94; war aims 56, 1 19; and war in Europe 55-6, 59, 84, 1 16-1 7 , 1 32-3 , 1 37-8, 142, 1 5 3 , 1 56-7, 1 64; and war in Africa 56, 58-64, 79-80, 97-9; and war in Pacific 64; and peace settlement chaps 7, B passim; between wars 249-50 Gold Coast 1 5 , 103 , 1 70 Gouraud , Genera l Henri 201-2, 2 1 5-19, 23 5-6, 245 Gout, Jean 28, 66, 74, 90, 96, 125, 129, 146, 148, 1 54, 1 56-7, 1 59, 187, 195 , 204 Grahame, George 199 Great Britain, imperial rivalry with France (pre-war) 9, 1 1 -12, 24, 30-2, 44, 49-50; (wartime) 32, 60-4, 67-72, 87-99, 1 10- 1 5 , 124-30, 1 5 264; (post-war) chaps 7, 8 passim, 209, 2 14, 2 16-26, 23 1-5 , 239-42 ; see also British Empire, Cameroons, Entente

Cordiale, Palestine, Sykes­ Picot agreement, Syria, Togo Greece 67, 96, 1 2 1 , 196-7, 222-3 , 23 1-2 Grey, Sir Edward, 50, 70-3, 87-9, 97-9

groupe colonial de la Chambre 24, 147 , 209-12, 2 2 1 , 234

groupe de l'Afrique du Nord 233

groupe parlementaire d'itude des questions indigenes 3 1 groupe parlementaire du Maroc 225, 233

groupe senatorial pour la defense des intirets franfat's ii l'etranger 75 Gro up e m e n t des intirets franfais dans /'Empire Ottoman 278 Group e m e n t des sociitis coloniales 122, 149-5 1 , 165 Guadeloupe 213, 227 Guesde, Jules 1 1 8 Guinea, French 1 36

Haig, Field Marshal Sir Douglas (later Earl) 143 Haiti 28 Hamelin, Colonel 1 77 Hankey, Sir Maurice 1 8 1 Harcourt, Viscount 6 3 , 98 Hardinge of Penshurst, Baron 186, 193, 2 14 , 22 1 , 222-5 , 232, 240 Harmand, Jules 104 Haussmann, Jacques 27 Hejaz 87-8, 1 12 , 1 2 5 ; see also Faisal , Husain Herero-Nama rising 59 Hindenburg, Field Marshal Paul von 2 1 1 Ho Chi Minh 246, 248 Houphouct-Boigny, Felix 244 House, Colonel 1 20, 163, 1 7 3 , 1 7 8 , 1 9 1 , 194 Hoyek, Monsignor 49, 66-7, 1 07 , 1 3 1 , 204, 245 Hubert, Lucien 47, 2 1 0- 1 1 Hughes, W . M . 64, 1 82-3 Hugo, Victor 4 1

Hulot, Baron 102 , 1 14 Huntziger, General 236 Husain ibn Ali, Sharif 87-92, 1 01-2 , 1 10, 186, 189 Husson, Lieutenant 69 Huvelin, Professor 100 Ibn Saud, King 2 1 8 Inde Franfaise 9; proposed cession of 36-7, 104, 1 50, 173, 193 India 12-13, 81, 104, 1 2 5 , 1 80, 200, 224, 243 , 246 indiginat, proposed reform of 3 1 , 47, 8 1-2 , 1 39, 243-5 Indochina 9- 10, 20, 24, 33-5, 104 , 1 19, 1 39 , 140, 142, 144, 148, 2 10, 2 1 2 , 237, 244, 246; proposed cession of 35, 78, 104 , 1 19, 169, 1 7 3 , 237 industry and the Empire 1 4-17, 42-3 , 1 34, 147-8, 2 1 1-1 3 , 228 , 248 investment, French, i n the Empire 14, 16-1 7, 226-7, 248; in the Ottoman Empire 40, 42- 3, 5 3 , 94, 278; in other countries 14, 1 7 , 2 1 2 , 248 Iraq 243; see also Mesopotamia Isaac, Auguste 2 1 1 Italy , imperial rivalry with France in Africa 79, 1 1 3 , 1 1 9-2 2 , 1 9 1 -2 , 2 4 9 ; i n Ottoman Empire 4 3 -4 , 46, 79 , 1 1 3-14, 1 19-22 , 2 16 , 222; and war i n Europe 79 , 1 22-3, 1 26; at peace conference chap.

B passim

Ivory Coast 16, 1 36, 244 Japan 34, 64 , 78-9, 1 2 5 , 1 80, 237 Jemal Pasha 88, 107-8 ]eunes Alginens 8 1 , 246 ]eunes Sinigalais 8 1 Jibuti 6 2 , 1 2 1 Joffre, Marshal Joseph 83-4 Jonchay, Colonel du 69 Jonnart, Charles 50, 105, 1 3 7 , 1 6 8 , 244-5

Index Jouannin, Andre 222 journal des Debats 194, 1 99 Kemal ,

Mustafa

2 1 5-19, 222-3 Kerr, Philip 162 Khaled , Emir 246 King, Dr Henry 203

196, 200 ,

Kitchener, Field Marshal Earl

66, 87-8, 92-3, 102

K l o t z , Louis-Lucien

2 12-13, 226-7 Kut-el-Amara 1 10

181,

Lamartine, Alphonse de 2 1 Lanessan, Jean-Marie de 10 Lausanne treaty 232 Lavigerie, Cardinal 27 Lavisse, Ernest 86-7, 165 Lawrence T.E. 94, 1 12, 1 5 2 ,

1 6 1 , 195

League of Nations 83, 1 19,

146, 1 7 1 , 182-3 , 205, 2 1 3 , 230

Lebanon, French traditional links with 40- 1 ; French pre­ war policy towards 4 5-54 passim; wartime pressure for French intervention in 68-70, 107-12, 124-6; in wartime diplomacy 92-3 ; peace settle­ ment and French mandate in

176-9, 188, 200-2, 204-6, 229-3 1, 235-6, 245; see also

Maronites, Syria Lebon, Andre 28 Lebrun, Alben 28, 137

Legion d'Orient 13 1 Lenin, V J . 17 , 1 1 5

Lettow-Vorbeck, General von

63

Levi, Sylvain 1 54, 187 Leygues, Georges 43, 47, 66,

69, 76, 105 , 106, 124, 127, 137, 161, 1 68, 175, 195, 204, 2 1 3 , 222 Liberia 35, 165, 180 Ligue Coloniale Franfaise (later Ligue Man'time et Coloniale Franfaise) 17, 3 1 , 103, 249 Ligue Franfaise 2 1 1 Lloyd George, David, 1 12-13,

1 3 7; and wartime Middle East 65, 1 13, 124, 126-7, 1 5 1-3, 1 58, 162-3 ; and peace nego­ tiations chaps 7, 8, 9 passim Loederich 147 London treaty (1915) 79 Long, Maurice 195 Long, Walter 198, 205 Lorin , Henri 147, 1 50 Loucheur, Louis 194 Ludendorff, General Erich 143 Lugard, Frederick 62 Lutaud, Charles 8 1 , 1 39 Lyautey, Marshal Hubert 22-3 , 80, 8 1 , 1 1 1 , 134, 141 , 201-2, 242-5 , 247 Lybyer 196 Lyons 1 6 , 76-7, 100, 147-8, 160, 167, 2 1 1 , 230 McMahon, Sir Henry 69-70,

Maxwell, General Sir John 68 M'Baye, Mody 81 Meinertzhagen, Colonel Richard 173 Mesopotamia 68, 95, 1 10, 125,

186, 198, 200, 203, 218, 22 1-2 Messali Hadj 246-7 Messimy, Adolphe 1 3 , 19 Micheler. General 134-5 Michelet, Jules 26 Millerand, Alexandre 69-72, 209, 2 1 3-22 passim Millet, Philippe 147, 1 50, 157, 167-8, 193 Millies-Lacroix, Raphael 28 Milner, Viscount 1 12 , 1 58, 189, 205

ministry of colonies, organiza­ tion of 18-22, 28-9, 132, 144 ,

169, 227

15,

88-91

ministry of commerce

1 39, 2 1 2

ministry of finance 43, 2 1 2-13 ministry of foreign affairs, or­ ganization of 22-3, 85, 105,

Madagascar 10, 58, 63, 1 19, Maginot, Andre 2 9 , 132--4, 1 50 Malraux, Andre 35-6 mandates 145-6 , 182-3 , 186; see also Cameroons, Iraq, Lebanon, Palestine, Syria, Togo Mandel, Georges 250 Mangareva 3 7 Mangin, General Charles 13,

135, 139, 2 1 1

Mantoux, Paul 181 Marchand, Jean-Baptiste 11, 23 Margerie, Pierre de 28, 66, 74,

90, 1 1 1 , 1 16, 124-5 , 126, 129, 1 3 1 , 146, 1 5 3 , 1 8 1 , 206 Marin, Louis 102, 12 1-2 Maronites 40- 1 , 48-5 3, 66-7, 92-3. 107-8, 110, 1 3 1 , 204, 205 ; see also Lebanon Marseilles 76-7, 160, 167, 2 1 1 , 230 Marx, Karl 29 Mas, General 147 Massey, W. F. 64, 183 Le Matin 59 Mauritius 104 Maury, abbe 14

143--4, 147

1 16, 168, 195. 206, 226 mise en 11aleur, campaign for 14, 1 32--4, 141-3, 2 1 1-1 3 , 226-8 missionaries 27, 4 1 , 43--4, 49, 94; see also L 'Oeu11re des Eco/es d'Onent Mission Laique 29 Mitterrand, Fran�ois 250 Moinier, General 23 Monzie, Anatole de 80 Morel, E . D. 60, 2 1 1 Morocco, pre-war 9, 1 1-12, 17, 22-3 , 24, 28, 30-1, 33, 37-9, 44, 57; wartime 80-2, 91, 1 34, 2 10; post-war 58, 165-6, 185, 192, 224-5 ; Spanish zone 38-9, 104, 1 5 1 , 173--4, 225; see also Tangier Mosul 89, 92, 93, 106, 174-6,

188-9, 197-8, 201 , 205-8, 2 14, 2 19, 238

Murray, General Sir Archibald

1 1 3, 124

Mutran, Nadra 5 1 , 69, 267

Index

300

Napoleon I, Emperor 40, 4 1 , 67 Napoleon III, Emperor 10, 13 nationalism, Arab 42, 45, 88, 91, 16 1 , 186, 202-5 , 215 (see also Faisal, Syria); French 25-7 , 29-32, 70, 166, 209, 238-42 (see also French lan­ guage); Turkish 45, 2 1 5-16 Nerval, Gerard de 41, 75 Netherlands 58, 170-1 New Caledonia 145, 2 1 1 New Hebrides 3 6 , 62 , 97 , 103-4, 145, 149, 165-6, 193, 230, 233 New Zealand, 64 Nicolson, Sir Arthur 90-3 Nicolson, , Harold 165 , 167 Nigeria 36, 61, 62, 97, 98, 103, 169-70 N i v e ll e , Gene ral R o b e rt 1 16-17, 124 , 135 Noblemaire, Georges 229 Northcliffe, Viscount 164

L 'Oeuvre des Eco/es d'On'ent 27, 49, 127-8, 1 52, 199, 2 17 , 220 oil 76, 198, 205 , 214, 2 17, 238; see also Mosul Oriemalism 4 1-2 Orlando, Vittorio Emmanuele 180 , 192 Ottavi 52 Ottoman Empire, foreign invest­ ment in 40, 42-3, 53-4, 94, 278; pre-war unrest in 45-54 passim; French religious protectorate in 40-3, 2 1 7-18; and the war 64-5, 68, 7 1-2, 107-12 , 125-6, 1 52-3 , 162-4; see also Lebanon , Mesopota­ mia, Palestine, Syria, Turkey Painleve, Paul chap. 5 passim, 144, 237 Palfologue, Maurice 86, 100-1 , 1 18, 2 13 P a l e s t i n e , a n d war time diplomacy 6 5 , 73-5 , 89 , 93-7, 99-101 , 106, 1 14-15 , 12 3-4,

126-30, 152-7 ; wartime cam­ paigns in 1 10, 1 1 1 , 125-6, 15 2-3; establishment of Brit­ ish mandate 170- 1 , 175-9, 187, 189-90, 200-2, 204-6, 2 14, 2 17-2 1 , 243; see also Syria, Zionism Pan-African Congress ( 1919) 184-5 parliament and the Empire 23-4, 3 1 , 57, 7 5 , 1 1 7-18, 1 3 5 , 143, 1 59, 167, 17 1-2 , 209-12, 221, 223, 226, 229, 249; see also foreign affairs commission parti colonial, pre-war 23-32 , chap. 2 passim; wartime 94, 97-9, 102-6, 1 13-14, 1 19-23 , 1 3 7 , 146- 5 1 , 1 58; post-war 165-9, 192, 198, 209-13; see also under names of colonialist militants and societies peace conference (Paris, 1919) chaps 7, 8 passim Peretti della Rocca, Emmanuel de 79-80, 97. 123, 144, 146, 1 5 1 , 168, 169-70, 1 84, 2 1 3 , 226 Pernot, Maurice 4 1 , 45-6, 53-4 Perreau-Pradier, Pierre 2 1 1-12 Petain, Marshal Philippe 1 16, 143 Petroleum Executive 2 1 7 Phares, Monsignor 1 3 1 Pichon, Stephen 22-3, 28, 50, 13 7 , 146, 1 5 1 , 1 5 3-4, 159-60, 165, 170, 174-5 , 178-9, chap.

8 passim

Picot: see Georges-Picot Poincare, Raymond, 49-50, 54 , 56, 72, 73-4, 84 , 86, 96, 1 5 1 , 1 7 5 , 181-2, 194-5 , 231-2 Pokrovski, N. N. 86, 1 18 Portugal 1 50 , 169 Potsdam agreement ( 1910) 44 Public opinion and the Empire 10, 17-18, 29-32, 5 5 , 70, 77, 9 1 , 97, 104, 166, 209-10, 229, 247-5 1 Quai d'Orsay: see ministry of foreign affairs

racism , against Africans 3 5 , 1 34-5 , 140-1 , 1 8 2 , 2 1 1 ; against French 223-4; against Indochinese 20, 3 5 , 140-1 ; against Syrians 109, 1 5 5 ; see also anti-semitism railways, in French Empire 143 , 228, 238, 244; in Ottoman Empire 43-4, 52-3 , 94 Redus, Onesime 3 5 , 103, 23 7 Regismanset, Charles 144 Reglement Organique ( 186 1) 4 1 , 48 Reinach, Joseph 127, 220 Revertera, Count 1 19 Reynaud, Paul 2 50 Rheinhart, Jules 1 3 3 Rhine, French w ar aims o n 58, 85-6, 1 1 7, 120, 163-5, 176 , 1 8 1 , 190, 195 , 239 ; see also Alsace-Lorraine Ribot , Alexandre chap . passim, 144, 237 Ristelhueber, Rene 50 Rober-Raynaud 80, 1 2 3 , 1 5 1 , 167, 168, 225-6, 2 3 3 , 238, 239 Romanones, Count 123, 1 73-4 Rondet-Saint, Maurice 1 8 Rosebery, Earl of 1 2 Rothschild, 2nd Baron 1 30 Rouen 147-8 Roume , Ernest 27, 36 Roux-Freissineng, Pierre 2 10 Rozet, Albin 76 Rue Oudinot: see ministry of colonies Russia, dual alliance with France 1 2 , 56, 74; and Otto­ man Empire 44, 72-4, 96, 100-1 , 1 1 5 , 1 17- 18, 1 2 1 , 124 , 1 56; 1917 revolutions 1 1 5 , 1 17 , 1 19 , 123-4, 1 3 8 , 145, 156 Saar 86, 147. 190 St Jean de Maurienne treaty 12 1-2 St Pierre et Miquelon 9, 36-7 , 173, 193 Salisbury, 3rd Marquess 1 3

Index Salonika expedition 84, 109-1 1 , 126

Samne, Georges 47, 105, 1 30 Samuel , Sir Herben 65, 220-1 Sarr Remo conference 2 17-18 Sarrail, General Maurice 84, 245

Sarraut, Alben 20, 168, 2 10- 1 2 , 226-7

Sazonow, Sergei 100 Selves, Justin de 2 3 , 146 Sembat, Marcel 1 18 Senart, Emile 42 , 76, 105 , 106, 1 14

Senate: see foreign affairs com­ mission (Senate), parliament Senegal 1 3 , 16, 8 1-2 , 1 3 5-6, 1 38, 228, 243-4

Senghor, Leopold 250 Service d'utilisation des produits coloniaux 2 2 , 1 32-3 Sevres treaty ( 1920) 222-3 shipping shonage 1 5 , 1 3 3 , 1 39,

106, 1 1 3-14, 1 2 1-2

sous-commission Asie-Oceanie 104-6

South Africa 63 Spain, policy towards Morocco and Tangier 38-9, 79-80, 1 23 ,

1 5 1 , 1 7 0, 173-4, 1 8 5 , 225 , 2 34-5 ; empire in Black Africa 145, 169 Spears, General Sir Edward 242 Steed, Wickham 195 Storrs, Ronald 66, 89, 1 5 3-5 Straits agreement ( 19 1 5) 72-4 Sykes, Sir Mark 8, 93-7, 100- 1 , 105, 1 1 2, 1 2 4 , 12 7-9, 1 54-60 Sykes-Picot agreement 7-8, 8797, 99-102 , 1 14-1 5 , 1 20, 1 5 3 , 1 56-7, 1 6 2 , 168, 17 1-2 , 199 , 216

182-3 ,

Syria, French pre-war policy to­ wards 44-54; French wartime policy towards 58, 65-78, 8 9-9 7 , 1 0 7 -1 2 , 1 1 7 - 1 8 , 1 22-3 1 , 1 5 1-63; French post­ war policy towards chaps 7, 8 passim, 2 1 5-19, 228-3 1 , 236, 239; decline and fall of French mandate 24 1-2 , 245-7 'Syrian party' 46, 73-6, 105-6,

Smuts, General Jan Christian

Tangier, pre-war negotiations on 38-9; parti colonial and

147, 228

Shotwell, J.T. 187 Siam 30, 33-5 Siegfried, Jules 2 1 1 Simon, Henry 29, 1 3 7 , 146,

149, 169-70, 1 7 5 , 190-2, 2 13 , 226 Simon, Stanislas 14 Slousch, Nahum 128 173

socialists a n d t h e Empire 1 17- 19, 1 3 3 , 228-9, 244, 245

Societe des Amis du ]udai'sme 127

1 14 , 1 24 , 199, 236, 24 1

79-80, 104, 1 5 1 , 166, 1 70, 192, 2 2 3-6 ; in wartime diplo­ macy 79-80, 1 23 , 1 5 1 ; post­

war negotiations on 9, 170,

173-4, 185, 192-3, 2 14, 2236, 2 33-5 , 2 38-9; see also

Societe d'Etudes Coloniales et Man'times 165-6 Sociite de Geographie Commer­ ciale 105 Societe pour le de11eloppement de Tanger 2 2 5 Sokolow, Nahum 1 28-30, 1 54 Solf, Wilhelm 56 Somaliland 192 Sonnino, Baron Giorgio 1 1 3 sous-commission Afn'q ue 103sous-commission Asie-Afn'q ue

The Times 59, 195

6, 1 1 4

Morocco Tardieu, Andre 1 54, 165, 168, 194

Tocqueville, Alexis de 29 Togo, conquest and wartime partition 6 1 , 97-9, 103, 148; and peace settlement 182, 232-3 , 235

Tonkin 30 Toutee , General 264 Toynbee, Arnold 178, 194 , 196 Trabaud, Captain 1 1 1 trade with Empire: see colonial trade Trans-Saharan Railway 238 Treaty: see under name of treaty Tunisia 79, 8 1-2, 9 1 , 1 34, 15 9, 168

Turke y ,

after

Great

War

196-7, 199, 2 1 5-19, 2 3 1-2 ;

see also Ottoman Empire Turkish Petroleum Company 205

Union Coloniale Franyaise 1 5 , 1 34 , 140-3, 1 5 5 , 2 1 1 , 225

United States 34, 44-5, 1 16-1 7 ; wartime attitude to French war aims 120, 1 30, 146, 149, 1 5 3 ; a t peace conference chap. 8 passim Vansittart, Roben 99, 193, 2 19, 243

Van Vollenhoven, Joost 1 36, 140

Varenne, Alexandre 244 Vatican 43, 1 5 5 Venizelos, Elutherios 67 Verdun 84 , 98, 109, 1 34 Vichy regime 249 Vigny, Alfred de 41 Viviani, Rene chap. 3 passim, 83

Le Temps 168, 194 , 199 Terrier, Auguste 8 1 , 99, 103-5 ,

Vivier de Stred, Edmond du

Tesseron,

Fernand-Alexandre

Weizmann, Chaim 126, 129-3 1 ,

Thomas, Alben 1 1 8, 145 Thwaites, General Sir William

Westermann, William 187 Weygand, General Maxime 245 Wilson, General Sir Henry 158,

145, 147, 1 50, 2 1 0

146

195

14, 1 32-3 , 143, 2 1 1 , 238

154-5 , 173 , 1 77-8, 187, 2 18

200

Index Wilson, President Woodrow 120, 126, 145-6, 149, 15 7, 161, 166, 173, chap. 8 passim

You, Andre 144, 146 Young Turk Revolution 45, 47 Yunnan 22-3, 34 Yusuf Pasha 48

t'., \ E' 1 T L L: / U •.

Zenie, Khalil 5 1 Zionism 65 , 10 1 , 1 1 5 , 126-31 , 1 54-6, 170 , 1 7 3 , 177-9, 187, 206, 2 1 7-18