A New Age
Despite the crushing disappointment of the Treaty of Bordeaux, the French Empire quickly established itself in southern France following the partition.
In many ways, the partition can actually be considered crucial to the success of the Return (as it later became known). While the Empire would have struggled to enforce its authority across the whole of France -especially over the syndicalist working class strongholds of Paris and the Channel ports - the smaller area of land it had to control actually made the Empire’s efforts at undoing two decades of syndicalism much more effective.
Additionally, the Communards themselves had found much use in promoting both patriotic dedication to France herself and hostility towards the imperialism of Germany. The rapidly expanding Imperial Bureau de L’Esprit Public built upon and subverted this message by blaming the Communards for France’s defeat and directing public animosity towards the German-imposed protestant king of northern France and his puppet government. This message, broadcast through the new national radio corporation, promoted the Emperor as the ‘Saviour of France’ who had prevented the fortunate southern French from falling under German occupation and who would protect the French from the Germans and restore the glory of France.
This message proved a success with thousands of recruits flocking to join the Empire’s military - so many that an immediate reorganisation of the army was announced.
The volunteers rallying to “rebuild the glory of France” and to “defend the sacred motherland from the Prussians”, as the slogans had it, were readily armed with the weapons and equipment captured in Communard supply dumps overrun during the Fall of France.
In particular, those deemed to be sufficiently loyal to the Emperor were formed into the newly formed Garde Impériale as a re-establishment of the Imperial Guard of the previous emperors. Three divisions strong it was stationed in the new capital of Bordeaux and charged with the direct defence of the Napoleon IV and his household.
However, the army was not the only branch of the Empire’s military to benefit from the influx of new recruits and captured equipment. A light cruiser, two destroyers and a flotilla of transports captured in Marseille harbour were refitted and added to the navy to act as a light squadron to ferry military personnel across the Mediterranean.
The first duty of this unit was to transport hundreds of coffins from Algiers to Marseille. These coffins contained the remains of Pieds-Noirs - many who were veterans of the first Weltkrieg and the French Civil War - who had expressed a desire in their wills to be buried in France once the homeland was liberated.
Upon the arrival of the coffins in Marseille, hundreds of horses conducted them in a several mile long procession to a newly established temporary cemetery in the Provence countryside - the long-term goal was for the remains to be ultimately relocated to the war cemetery at Verdun when it was once again in French hands.
This ceremony was an example of the heavy symbolism woven into every action of the government during the first year of the Return.
However, among the ceremonial actions there were also several hard-headed actions as well.
A grand plan was drawn up to rebuild France’s shattered industries and to expand the military in order to achieve superiority over the forces of northern France.
Though ravaged by war the factories of southern France, coupled with those of the Algerian coast, were already sufficient to have propelled the French Empire to the status of being the member of the Catholic League with by far the largest industrial base. This, including the plans for expansion, would prove the basis for future diplomatic efforts to move France into a position of leadership within the League.
In addition to these well publicised, the cabinet and the Emperor, in a top secret meeting, also approved three proposals from a selection of suggestions by top scientific, military and diplomatic minds as to how to boost the power of the Empire and to achieve ultimate parity with the Mitteleuropa.
The first of the proposals approved was the establishment of a network of agents and propagandists throughout occupied northern France. Inspired by the American Underground Railroad, this network would work to persuade people to cross the border to the French Empire and to undermine the efforts of the northern government to establish its authority.
The second of the proposals was the investment of a huge portion of the research budget on weapons research. Though top secret, it would become known to foreign governments, through various sources, that the Empire was working to develop and test rockets suitable for use in war.
However, this was a cover for the true nature of the project: the development of some of the more obscure, but plausible, theories of atomic researchers that hypothesised the potential for a bomb capable of destroying entire cities in an instant. Though many remained highly sceptical of the project, De Gaulle had been convinced of the merits of the project through its huge potential and the indications from research from other leading countries that such a weapon was possible. The ultimate product of this project, codenamed Jericho, would be the Atomic Bomb.
The third proposal approved was much more to the taste of the conventional military thinkers.
The breakup of the Ottoman Empire during the Arab Revolt had seen the establishment of an independent Libya and the territorial expansion of Egypt and Hashemite Arabia at the expense of the Turks.
With the French military being far superior to that of the Arab alliance and Libya combined, and with the situation in Europe stable for the time being, the possibility now existed for the expansion of French Africa at the expense of the Arab blocked.
Both the Emperor and De Gaulle were supportive of the vision of a new imperium stretching from west to east across the whole of Africa and readily supported the third proposal: to begin making preparations to annex Libya and the Sudan directly into the Empire.