Chapter 1406 - 3: The Iron-Blooded President

Chapter 1406: Chapter 3: The Iron-Blooded President

Clemenceau chose to stake everything on a single throw not only because he already had no retreat left, but more importantly out of a desire to preserve France.

France suffered a heavy blow in the First World War, losing a vast number of people, and the outcome of the war for France further impressed upon the French leadership the importance of population. Had France not been inferior to Germany in demographic terms, it would not have fallen into today’s predicament.

Although French industry has now fallen behind that of Germany, in the final analysis this must be traced back to the population question. After all, compared with Germany, metropolitan France lacks the basic mineral resources needed for industrial development, whereas the resources of France’s colonies are by no means poor.

However, the exploitation of these colonial resources also requires population as support; otherwise, the resistance movements in the colonies alone would be enough to leave the French Government at its wits’ end.

On this point, East Africa has done very well. The rapid population growth that began in the colonial Era is precisely the foundation on which East Africa has been able to expand and monopolize half the African Continent.

If traditional European colonial methods had been adopted, East Africa could never have swelled to its present scale. Of course, this is also due to the high fertility of German and Far East migrants; the same is true of the Slavic migrants who are East Africa’s third-largest source of immigration, although the Slavic migrants in East Africa have long since been Germanized.

Needless to say, the fertility found in East Africa is something that the French Government—or rather, the current leadership of the French Government—deeply envies.

In a voice heavy with pain, Clemenceau said, "France lost many precious lives in the war, among them not a few young men. They ought to have been the future of France, bearing the heavy responsibility of France’s reproductive work, yet because of our misjudgment of the war at the outset, they died on the battlefield."

"Therefore, for the future of France, we must cherish even more dearly the French people who have survived to this day."

"If events truly unfold as East Africa has described, this wave of plague will likely claim even more lives—this is something I cannot accept."

Seeing that the will of the President could not be altered, the senior officials of the government ceased to argue and instead asked, "Mr. President, what are we to do?"

Although Clemenceau’s prospects were bleak, it was undeniable that he remained the supreme leader of France, and he was known during the war for his hardline methods. Thus no one in the government dared to provoke Clemenceau’s tigerish temper or engage in the hypocrisy of outward compliance and inner resistance.

Seeing that morale could be marshaled, Clemenceau said with satisfaction, "Gentlemen, for the sake of France let us fight once more. As for how we will be remembered after we are gone, let posterity judge! This time we need only act so that our consciences remain clear."

"Issue my order: France is to enter a state of emergency. From this moment, the government is to revert entirely to a wartime footing, imposing strict control over national supplies, especially medical resources."

"All French citizens must carry out their production and daily activities under government arrangements. In areas heavily afflicted by the epidemic, impose strict controls on movement in and out, and ensure proper registration and record-keeping."

"Health departments, the army, the police, and other relevant bodies, under unified government command, are to carry out large-scale disinfection and extermination operations nationwide."

"In particular, the ruins left by the war and the corpses on the battlefields must all be treated professionally, to prevent the formation of new sources of infection and to guard against the emergence of other plagues..."

On the Western Front, French territory was itself the main theater of war, especially the north of France, and this resulted in countless buildings being destroyed by artillery and enormous casualties.

And in some ruins and battlefields, there is a high probability that corpses remain uncleared, so Clemenceau gave special emphasis to this point.

"Strictly control the distribution of medicines; crack down on criminals who hoard and jack up prices. At such a time, if anyone dares to defy the government, treat it as treason."

"Conduct an inventory of the supplies stored in warehouses requisitioned by the wartime government and military; thoroughly investigate the illicit resale of materials. Though the war is over, the fight against the plague is a new war. I do not wish to hear unpleasant news reaching my ears..."

To wage the war, France had stockpiled massive quantities of supplies, and now, with the war over, these materials remained piled up in warehouses. Clemenceau intended to make use of this neglected hoard.

"Implement special governance measures in epidemic-stricken areas. Until the crisis is resolved, strictly enforce a regime of isolation, with the government centrally directing the deployment of medical and health resources nationwide, and the delivery and circulation of essential goods..."

Clemenceau assigned each task in an orderly manner, but the more the other members of the government listened, the more alarmed they became.

The reason was simple: as an old stronghold of social movements, France’s rulers know better than anyone how difficult the French populace is to manage.

It must be remembered that France has only just emerged from the war; the French people were repressed for five years. Now Clemenceau’s orders, one after another, are in effect casting France back into the shadows.

Only, previously it was the shadow of war; now it is the shadow of plague. At a time when the destructive power of this wave of epidemic cannot be fully confirmed, Clemenceau’s series of measures amounts to telling the French people outright that this epidemic crisis is in no way inferior to war.

If the epidemic develops as Clemenceau anticipates, then so much the better. But if it ends in anticlimax, the image of this administration in the minds of the French people will truly be beyond redemption.

Moreover, whether the French Government has the capacity on its own to keep the plague within controllable bounds is itself a question. If, just as in the Era of the Black Death, all measures prove helpless, then the situation will be even harder to bring to a conclusion.

With such concerns in mind, someone nervously asked President Clemenceau, "Mr. President, is this not perhaps making a mountain out of a molehill? If circumstances exceed our expectations and control, I fear that none of us will be able to give an account to the nation."

President Clemenceau waved his hand and said, "Do not try to dissuade me any further. However bad things get, they cannot be worse than they are now! You need not worry; you need only act in accordance with my orders. I alone will bear all the eventual consequences—even if it means infamy, I will shoulder it!"

Seeing that the President’s attitude was resolute and that he was willing to assume responsibility himself, the others did not dare say more.

In fact, by this point, although Clemenceau’s reputation among the French people had sharply declined, his power had not been shaken in the slightest.

As the saying goes, "Misfortune rides on fortune’s back, fortune lies in misfortune’s lap." Precisely because France is now a wreck, Clemenceau’s rivals have no wish to take over the mess, and his authority has suffered no loss. This, in turn, gives him greater confidence in carrying out his policies.

At the start of 1920, as East Africa braced itself and prepared in earnest to confront the plague, France followed closely behind and imposed nationwide martial law.

The actions of the two governments were naturally observed by other countries around the world and provoked much discussion. Some states supported the stance of the two countries, but quite a few sneered at their approach, even nursing the mindset of spectators at a play.

Countries outside Europe in particular tended to regard the matter as none of their concern and hung it high on the wall. Many failed to grasp the destructive potential of this plague—not only because information was delayed and understanding was insufficient, but also because many did not believe that this epidemic could spread so rapidly.

Moreover, no plague of such scale had previously occurred in the world. After all, the current global configuration is vastly different from that before the nineteenth century: today the world market has taken shape, which has led to increasingly frequent trade, cultural, and military exchanges between continents and regions.

This has in turn greatly intensified the movement of people between countries and regions, and when people travel frequently, it naturally means that, if a large-scale infectious disease breaks out, the likelihood of its becoming a global disease increases dramatically.

The Spanish flu in the previous world was precisely such a case: at that time the global population was 1.8 billion, and nearly half were affected.

Some estimates even suggest that during the Spanish flu pandemic from 1918 to 1919 in the previous world, between fifty million and one hundred million people died.

If this figure is accurate, it far exceeds the total number of casualties in the entire First World War.