in grant paid during it.

When Prussia beat France in 1870 she asked for an indemnity of five
milliards. The Entente could have demanded from the vanquished an
indemnity and then have reassumed relations with them provided it were
an indemnity which they could pay in a brief period of time.

Instead, it being impossible to demand an enormous sum of 300 or 400
milliards, a difficult figure to fix definitely, recourse was had to
another expedient.

From the moment that the phrase _reparation des dommages_ was included
in the armistice treaty as a claim that could be urged, it became
impossible to ask for a fixed sum. What was to be asked for was
neither more nor less than the amount of the damages. Hence a special
commission was required, and the Reparations Commission appears on
the scene to decide the sum to demand from Germany and to control
its payment. Also even after Germany was disarmed a portion of her
territory must remain in the Allies' hands as a guarantee for the
execution of the treaty.

The reason why France has always been opposed to a rapid conclusion of
the indemnity question is that she may continue to have the right, in
view of the question remaining still open, to occupy the left bank of
the Rhine and to keep the bridgeheads indicated in the treaty.

The thesis supported by Clemenceau at the Conference was a simple one:
Germany must recognize the total amount of her debt; it is not enough
to say that we recognize it.

I demand in the name of the French Government, and after having
consulted my colleagues, that the Peace Treaty fixes Germany's debt
to us and indicates the nature of the damages for which reparation is
due. We will fix a period of thirty years if you so wish it, and we
will give to the Commission, after it has reduced the debt to figures,
the mandate to make Germany pay within these thirty years all she owes
us. If the whole debt cannot be paid in thirty years the Commission
will have the right to extend the time for payment.

This scheme was agreed. And the thesis of the compensation of damages,
instead of that for the payment of the cost of the War, prevailed for
a very simple reason. If they proposed to demand for all integral
reparations, and therefore the reimbursement of the cost of the War,
the figures would have been enormous. It became necessary to reduce
all the credits proportionally, as in the case of a bankruptcy. Now,
since in the matter of the indemnities France oc