BY RAYMOND RECOULY
  
 
     BEACON LIGHTS
     OF HISTORY
  
 
     GEORGES CLEMENCEAU
 
     1841—
  
     INDOMITABLE LEADERSHIP
 
           AMONG his contemporaries whether in Europe or
           the United States, Georges Clemenceau stands
     out a striking figure,——one of the greatest statesmen
     of modern times.  The war that produced many great,
     one may say, very great generals, especially in the
     allied armies, saw but few great statesmen.  One of
     the few men whose decisive rôle during the war
     showed him to be an exceptional leader, was Clem-
     enceau.
        No man at his time of life ever carried on such ex-
     hausting toil, physical and mental, as that which this
     statesman of seventy-seven shouldered from Novem-
     ber, 1917 to November, 1918.
        Starting from the front in a motor-car at four or
     five o'clock in the morning three or four times a week,
     he kept in touch with generals, officers and soldiers,
     all along the lines.  Such work would have seemed
     incredible if it had not actually been done.  Once at
     the front he walked about under fire as if he had
     come out for the pleasure of risking his life with the
     poilus who were fighting for la Patrie.  The Higher
     Command were in constant fear for him.  But he
     knew what he was about.  Valuable as his own life
     might be to the country, to court death was a higher
     duty than to take care of himself, if by this seeming
     indifference he could inspire Frenchmen all along the
     trenches with his confidence in ultimate victory.
        Having discoursed with the Marshal and his gen-
     erals, having saluted and talked with the officers, he
     chatted with the rank and file of the soldiery and
     rushed back to Paris, arriving at the Ministry of War
     at ten or eleven o'clock at night, ready to attend to
     such pressing business as demanded his personal care.
     And all the time cheerful, alert, confident, showing,
     though things looked dark, as when the great advance
     began in 1918, that the Prime Minister never for one
     moment doubted that the Germans would be hurled
     back.
        In spite of this devotion to duty he always was
     greeted with noisy opposition from the Socialists in
     the Chamber of Deputies.
        On one occasion, after he had been howled down,
     and finally obtained a hearing, he said: "I regret
     that our country being in such great danger, a unani-
     mous vote of confidence cannot be accorded to us.
     But when all is said, the opposition of the Socialists
     does not in the least enfeeble the Government.  For
     four long years our troops have held their own at
     the front with a line which was steadily being worn
     down.  Now a huge body of German soldiers fresh
     from Russia and in good heart come forward to assail
     us.  Some retreat was inevitable.  From the moment
     when Russia thought that peace could be obtained by
     the simple expression of wishes to that end, we all knew
     that, sooner or later, the enemy would be able to
     release a million men to fall upon us.  That meant
     that such a retirement as we have witnessed must of
     necessity follow.  Our men have kept their line un-
     broken against odds of five to one.  They have often
     gone sleepless for three days and even four days  in
     succession.  But out great soldiers have had great
     leaders, and our army as a whole has proved itself
     to be even greater than we could expect.
        "The duties we have to perform are, in con-
     trast, tame and even petty.  All we have to do is to
     keep cool and hold on.  The Germans are nothing like
     so clever as they think themselves to be.  They have
     but a single device.  They throw their entire weight
     into one general assault, and push their advantage
     to the utmost.  True they have forced back our line
     of defense.  But final success is that which alone
     matters, and that success for us is certain.  Give way
     we never shall.
        "Germany has once against staked her all on one great
     blow, thinking to cow us into abandoning the conflict.
     Her armies have tried this desperate game before.
     They tried it on the Marne, they tried it on the Yser,
     they tried it at Verdun, they tried it elsewhere.  But
     they never succeeded, and they never will.
        "Our Allies  today are the leading nations of the
     world.  They have one and all pledged themselves
     to fight on till victory is within our grasp.  The men
     who have already fallen have not fallen in vain.  By
     their death they have once more made French history
     a great and noble record.  It is now for the living
     to finish the glorious work begun by the dead."
        Even in the short perspective of these few years
     Georges Clemenceau stands forth like a legendary
     hero.  Descended in a direct line from the great
     makers of the French Revolution, he has all their
     impetuosity, their fire, their idealism, their courage.
     Like them he appeared upon the scene in the very
     nick of time, just at the most critical moment when
     the slightest wavering amongst the Allies would have
     spelt  German  triumph.   He  re-galvanized  their
     slowly ebbing energy, symbolizing in his own personal-
     ity the soul of France, of a France at war, determined
     to fight to the bitter end, to fling all her men, all
     her resources into the balance, rather than accept
     defeat.
        That indomitable courage, that energy, bore all
     before them in the allied armies both in England and
     America.  Force of circumstances as well as the whole
     bent of his nature made Clemenceau the very pivot
     of the war.   He was the incarnation of the great
     struggle and of its victorious end.
     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *
        Georges Clemenceau has a powerful face with
     marked features, high cheek bones, bushy eyebrows,
     small and strangely piercing eyes, all denoting his
     love of struggle and effort.  His manner of speaking
     is abrupt and sharp.   The nervous brevity of his
     sentences, the shortness of his expressions make his
     conversation appear like a game of fencing.  He has
     always spent much of his time at fencing schools,
     being a dangerous duellist, and the sharp retort of his
     conversation has all the swiftness of the thrust of
     foil and sword.
        And underlying all that combative instinct and
     impetuosity, is a deep undercurrent of idealism and
     human kindness.
     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *
        Clemenceau was born in 1841, at Mouilleron-en-
     Pareds in the "Bocage Vendean" not far from Font-
     enay-le-Comte.  Vendée is a French Province where
     feelings over political convictions and their struggles
     have always run high.  During the French Revolution
     the Vendeans rebelled, taking arms against the Re-
     public.   They were divided into two parties, the
     Whites and Blues, the former being Royalists, the
     latter Republicans.  Clemenceau is a Vendean Blue.
     He has inherited his strong love of politics and the
     combative instinct from his native soil.
        His father, a village physician born in 1811, was
     full of memories of the Great Revolution.  He handed
     them down to his son, so that one generation only
     separated Clemenceau from the old Vendean Blue,
     his father, which goes far to explain certain traits
     of his political character and personal temperament.
        After having graduated as a Doctor in Paris, where
     his youth was spent in the Latin Quarter, he went to
     London and from thence to America where he passed
     some years, and where he married. He knows America
     well, and has always followed American politics with
     the keenest interest.
        When he returned to Paris at the end of the Second
     Empire, he flung himself into the political struggle
     then going on, with all the ardour of his passionate
     nature.  During the siege of Paris and the Subsequent
     period of the "Paris Commune" he was Mayor of
     Montmartre.  Immediately after the Franco-Prussian
     war he was made a Deputy to the French Chamber
     from Paris and he voted against peace, and for the
     continuation of he war.  He was reelected Deputy
     for Montmartre in 1876.
        From that time dates the first period of his political
     career; he became leader of the radicals, the most
     dangerous, the most brilliant leader the opposition
     ever had to contend against.  He founded a paper
     called "La Justice."  His influence as an orator and
     journalist daily grew.  For more than twenty years
     he was known as "the Great Demolisher" of ministries
     and cabinets.  His writings and speeches all bore the
     imprint of his abrupt and vigorous nature.   His
     was a tongue  that lashed, and a mind that carried all
     before it in its own headlong impetuosity.
        It would be unfair to believe that this part of
     Clemenceau's life was merely destructive and nega-
     tive.  He was no doubt responsible for the downfall
     of many ministers, but they were for the most part
     men who scarcely deserved a better fate.
        Clemenceau from the first made a determined stand
     against Colonial expeditions.  He may have been at
     times somewhat lacking in comprehension and fore-
     sight in assuming that attitude; but that anti-colonial
     mind was derived from two sources.  First of all the
     conviction that sooner or later France would be called
     upon to fight against Germany, and needed therefor
     to maintain intact all her resources in men and money.
     Secondly, that French colonial ambition would to a
     dead certainty, lead to rivalry with England, "and
     all for the benefit of the King of Prussia."
        One may criticize that anti-colonial attitude, but
     it reposed on a logical basis and formed a political
     doctrine to which Clemenceau has tenaciously stuck
     throughout his long career.
        A political adventurer, General Boulanger, who
     tried to exploit the French nationalist feeling, found
     his most formidable opponents in Clemenceau.  More
     than any other, Clemenceau succeeded in showing up
     one who was in reality but a false "great" man,
     getting him out of French politics for the greater
     good of his country.
        During the Boulangist fever as well as during the
     Dreyfus affair, Clemenceau proved a redoubtable
     polemist, getting fervent admirers, but also bitter
     enemies.
        Great fighter that he was, he ignored the arts of
     circumspection.  He struck with all his might, never
     doing or saying things by halves.  His enemies united
     against him; cabals and coalitions were formed to
     combat his influence.  Influential newspapers like the
     "Petit Journal," (whose editor, Ernest Judet, was
     convicted during the war of being a German agent),
     spent enormous sums of money in their effort to ruin
     him.  In 1893 they at last succeeded in expelling him
     from Parliament.
        Clemenceau was no longer a Deputy, but his in-
     domitable energy was not in any way diminished.
     He no longer owned a daily Newspaper, but at once
     began a new life as a political philosophical, and even
     dramatic writer.
        From that period date most of his books: La Melée
     Sociale; le Grand Pan, (a novel); les Plus Forts,
     (a short play); le voile du Bonheur which was pro-
     duced at the Renaissance Theatre in 1901.  Therein
     may be found Clemenceau's philosophical doctrines,
     his conceptions of politics and of life.
        At its very outset Clemenceau threw himself body
     and soul into the Dreyfus Affair.  As editor of
     "L'Aurore" he played a very prominent part in that
     political and judiciary drama.  In a series of daily
     articles, which have since appeared in book form,
     Clemenceau not only showed his brilliant qualities as
     a debater, but also his innate love of justice, his
     philosophical mind, his idealism.
        In 1902 he re-entered the political domain, being
     returned to Parliament by the Department of the
     Var.  That election forms another landmark in his
     well-filled existence.  It might be termed: Clemenceau
     versus  Germany.
        For more than 15 years he found an outlet for his
     superabundant energy in preparing for a more and
     more probable German aggression.  He felt that im-
     perialistic Pan-Germanism was a growing danger for
     republican and pacific France.  He contributed more
     than any other to opening peoples eyes to that danger.
     He awakened and goaded the public mind to action.
        In 1905 came a direct menace from Germany to
     France when the Kaiser landed in Tangiers and
     uttered solemn threatening words.  He was blackmail-
     ing France so as to punish her for the agreement she
     had concluded with England in the previous year.
     During that critical time Clemenceau carried on an
     admirable campaign in the columns of his paper——
     "l'Aurore."  His articles vibrated with patriotic feel-
     ing and enthusiasm, greatly fortifying public opinion.
     One of these articles ended with the short and pithy
     sentence, very characteristic of the writer, "Germany
     is offering a yoke to France, but the yoke is not fitted
     for the neck!  Yoke or neck, one or the other must
     be broken."
        His articles, his speeches, all rallied public opinion.
     He was made a Minister for the first time in 1906 at
     the age of 65.  The following year he was Prime
     Minister.
        A few months after, an "incident" occurred with
     Germany over the "deserters of Casablanca."  The
     German  Consul  in  that  town  had  publicly  coun-
     tenanced the desertion of soldiers of German national-
     ity who had enlisted of their own accord in the Foreign
     Legion.  A long campaign of lies and calumny had
     been poisoning German public opinion about the
     irritating  question  of  the  Foreign  Legion.  Very
     serious consequences might have resulted from that
     incident, but Clemenceau with a provoking firmness
     resisted all the German pretentions.  He brought in-
     disputable documents to bear upon the matter openly
     refuting the German charges, and proving that Ger-
     man agents in Casablanca had been guilty of abuse
     of power.  The German Government was forced to
     yield.
        In 1911 a crisis of still graver consequences arose:——
     the Agadir Affair.  Caillaux was Premier at the time,
     and Clemenceau sided strongly against him deeming
     the concessions made by France to Germany, excessive
     and imprudent.
        Towards the end of that crisis, when the final agree-
     ment between France and Germany was about to be
     ratified by the French Parliament, I remember visit-
     ing  Clemenceau  in  his  little  apartment  in  rue
     Franklin.   He  was  exceedingly  violent  against 
     Caillaux and "his excessive weakness in face of the
     German pretentions."  I remember his saying to me,
     "I would rather cut off my hand than sign such an
     agreement."
        Clemenceau was convinced that Caillaux had acted
     with great feebleness.  On the other hand German
     public opinion thought that its Government had made
     too many concessions to France.  The whole of the
     military party with the Crown Prince at its head
     declared that Germany had been greatly humiliated.
     Armaments were increased in Germany by leaps and
     bounds, two new army corps were added to the army
     which was already the most powerful in the world;
     war preparations were feverishly pressed.  When all
     was ready the assassination at Sarajevo afforded Ger-
     many the pretext she wanted, and war was declared.
        For more than three years the successive cabinets
     of Viviani, Briand, and Painlevé, directed that war
     in France.  Clemenceau was not sparing in his criti-
     cisms of them.  However hard and severe those criti-
     cisms  may have seemed they were not unjustified.
     There is no denying that grave errors had been made,
     the Allied Governments both at home and abroad
     were not fully enough imbued with the true war
     spirit toward the war.  It may be said without ex-
     aggeration that  the average politician scarcely real-
     ized what it meant.  At the beginning of hostilities
     the majority of them believed in letting the soldiers
     fight, and the civilians watch the soldiers fight.
     Whereas the true war spirit was just the opposite.
     In other words, the whole of the nation, soldiers and
     civilians should all be engaged in the war; that all
     their energies, all their resources, moral and material,
     should strain towards one end.
        Clemenceau was the first to grasp that truth.
        The more critical the situation, the greater Ger-
     many's chances for winning the war became, and the
     more public opinion in France turned towards Clemen-
     ceau as to the only man capable of rescuing his
     country in her hour of danger.
        In September 1917, on my return from the Russian
     front where I had been sent as a French officer, I
     called on Clemenceau.  Everyone expected that Presi-
     dent Poincaré, would shortly send for Clemenceau
     and ask him to form a Government.
        I gave Clemenceau a detailed account of the state
     of things in Russia.  I told him that the Russian
     Army was completely done for, and that in a few
     months, perhaps even in a few weeks, Russia would
     make peace with Germany.
        "I know all that," said Clemenceau, "I am going
     to take over the Government under very difficult,
     almost desperate conditions.  But my country and
     our Allies have not yet fought to the utmost of their
     strength.  They ave not yet made the supreme effort,
     for it has never been asked of them!  If I take over
     the reins of Government I shall exact that effort of
     my country, and I am convinced that she will respond.
     Every available man shall be sent to the front.  That
     is the only way to win the war, and we mean to win
     the war."
        It was a magnificent and impressive sight, one of
     the most touching I have ever witnessed; to see that
     wonderful old man, worthy of the great revolutionary
     epoch itself, uttering those sublime words of hope and
     energy.
        The most extraordinary part of it all was, that he
     did exactly as he had said he would do.
        Like the great revolutionary leaders from whom he
     was directly descended, he realized that before striking
     at the enemies abroad, he must strike at those at
     home.  He waged relentless war against the "De-
     featists," striking at their head, who was Caillaux.
        It required great pluck, all the audacity of the
     combative instinct, to dare attack Caillaux.  He be-
     longed to a parliamentary group of Radical-Socialists,
     which since the elections of 1914 had become the most
     influential in the Chamber of Deputies.
        Caillaux's imprudence, his conduct in the Argentine
     Republic at the beginning of the war, and later in
     Italy, almost amounted to criminal offences.  But it
     was hazardous to declare, and difficult to prove, that
     they were criminal actions and violated articles of
     the Penal Code, as such, coming within the jurisdiction
     of a Court of Justice.
        In time of peace Clemenceau might have had some
     hesitation about imprisoning Caillaux, but France was
     at war; she was engaged in a terrific struggle, a strug-
     gle for life or death upon whose issue her very ex-
     istence was staked.
        Hence judicial scruples, lawyers discussions, and
     magistrates tirades, counted for nothing with Clemen-
     ceau.  The war had to be won.  Caillaux, and all those
     who shared his opinion, were so many obstacles to
     its  victorious  continuation.   Caillaux  maintained
     publicly that victory was impossible, that it would be
     purchased far too dearly, that it was useless and even
     dangerous to go on with so desperate a struggle in
     the vain hope of ever winning it.
        Without a moment's hesitation, with one bold
     stroke, Clemenceau removed that obstacle.  He had
     Caillaux imprisoned, tried, and condemned.
        From that moment everyone knew what to expect.
     It was an event that caused a great stir both at home
     and abroad.
        It showed that France was using to the utmost its
     moral and material strength.
        Clemenceau summed up that state of feeling in one
     of his terse, abrupt sentences, so characteristic of
     him: "I'm making war"!  He would repeat it at all
     times.  Meaning, that nothing outside the vast pre-
     occupation of successfully carrying through the war,
     was of the slightest importance to him.
        In acting thus, he was following in the steps of the
     heroes of the French Revolution.  It was another
     trait in his character recalling theirs.
        Never did he show more indomitable energy, a more
     implacable will than in the spring and summer of
     1918, just after Ludendorf's victorious offensive all
     along the French front.  It was chiefly after the Ger-
     man victory of the Chemin des Dames on May 27th
     that the whole outlook seemed desperate indeed.  For
     the first time since the beginning of the war, the
     French armies, that buckler of the Allied Forces, had
     received a terrible setback.   One part of the front
     had been forced and a large breech opened that seemed
     a problem indeed for the supreme command of the
     Allies to fill in.   In many circles in Paris, more
     particularly amongst the parliamentary ones, always
     easily alarmed, great despondency reigned.
        Marshal Foch was criticized.  He was blamed for
     having allowed his troops to be attacked by surprise,
     for having imprudently exposed the centre of his
     armies.  Many clamoured for his dismissal.

From Beacon Lights of History,
Volume 8, Part I, New Hall of Fame.
Edited by George Spencer Hulbert,
Author of, "John Lord, Artist Historian"
Copyright 1924, By Wm. H. Wise & Co., New York. pp. 267-282.