History Spotlight, 4/8

The Entente Cordiale is signed today in 1904, ending almost a thousand years of hatred and acrimony between the United Kingdom and France. As with most European diplomatic overtures of the day, it was less about peace and friendship and more about the efficient exploitation of the dusky-hued peoples of the world. It was one-third of the Triple Entente, the other two parts being the Anglo-Russian Entente and the Franco-Russian Alliance.

Throughout the latter half of the 19th century, France had been becoming progressively more isolated from its Continental neighbors. After Napoleon tried - and nearly succeeded - in conquering Europe, the Russians and Germans had been keeping their distance. With France's disastrous loss in the Franco-Prussian War in 1871, Germany really ramped up the pressure. It got to the point where the only European power that would even speak to France was Great Britain.

But there were two problems with that. First there was the racial animosity between the two powers that went back to Hastings, 1066. Second, there was Britain's innate isolationism from squabbles on the Continent. They felt that it was best to let the bally Continentals settle things amongst themselves rather than get involved. The Napoleonic Wars took care of that. During those wars, the British had a hard lesson learned that just ignoring what happened on the Continent could come back and bite them in the ass in a serious way, especially when it threatened their globe-spanning empire. On top of that, the rise of Germany as a world power, especially in Africa, had Britain worried that an isolationist policy was making them weaker, not stronger.

The first feelers were sent out in the 1880's between Britain's Prince Albert and France's Leon Gambetta and they found some common ground: they didn't like Germany and they liked pushing natives around. The diplomatic rancor that led up to the Russo-Japanese War in 1904 saw them face the prospect of having to go to war against each other because of their respective allies (France with Russia and Britain with Japan) neither of whom they liked very much. To get out of this, France and Britain decided to let bygones be bygones and settled their differences.

The Entente Cordiale consisted, roughly of:

1) Britain gets Egypt and France gets Morocco. Both parties get access to the Suez Canal.
2) Britain gets Newfoundland (France retains fishing rights off the coast) and France gets a coastal town in Africa and Guinea in South America.
3) Britain gets Siam (now known as Thailand) and France gets Madagascar. They agreed to split the New Hebrides, an island chain in the South Pacific.

Honestly, with the exception of the Suez Canal, I don't know why anyone would go to war for any of these possessions, unless they actually lived there. But colonial politics have always baffled me.

The entente worked, and celebrated its centennial in 2004. That old devil, The Law of Unintended Consequences reared its ugly head in the guise of Germany. Germany was feeling very pouty and left out by the Anglo-French love fest. France made matters worse by pushing Germany around even more - after all, they were allies with the British! They could do whatever they wanted. Germany didn't like that one bit and it led to the gradual increase of bad feelings in the Germanic states that led, inexorably, to World War I.