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 occupied the first place (to begin with, she asked sixty-five per cent. of all sums paid by Germany), she took the greater part of the indemnities, while on the sums paid for reimbursement of cost of war, she would only have got less than twenty per cent.

Germany has therefore been put under control for all the time she will be paying the indemnities—­that is, for an indefinite time.

The valuation of the expenses for the reconstruction of the ruined territories had to be carried out according to the regulations of the treaty, and, the prices having increased, the French Government presented in July, 1920, a first approximate valuation:  damages, 152 milliards; pensions, 58 milliards; in all, 210 milliards.  In November, 1920, the damages had increased to 218 milliards.

Even these figures represent something less absurd than the first demands and figures.

On September 5, 1919, the French Minister of Finance, speaking in the French Chamber, calculated the total of the German indemnities arising from the treaty at 375 milliards, whose interest would accumulate until 1921, after which date Germany would begin to pay her debt in thirty-four annual rates of about 25 milliards each, and 13,750 milliards a year would go to France.

Again, in November, 1920, Ogier, Minister of the liberated regions, put before the Reparations Commission in the name of France a detailed memorial which made the value of the territories to be reconstructed only for the cases of private individuals come to 140 milliards, not including the pensions, damage to railways and mercantile marine, which totalled 218 milliards, of which 77 milliards were for pensions and 141 milliards for damages.

Of late the sense of reality has begun to diffuse itself.  The Minister Loucheur himself has laughed at the earlier figures, and has stated that the damages do not exceed eighty milliards.

But the French public has been accustomed for some time to take the figures of Klotz seriously, and to discuss indemnities of 150, 200 and 250 milliards.  The public, however, is not yet aware of the real position, and will not be able to arrive at a just realization of it without passing through a serious moral crisis which will be the first secure element of the real peace.

Setting aside all questions of indemnities from Austria-Hungary, Turkey and Bulgaria (they have nothing to give, can give nothing; on the contrary, they ask and merit assistance), it is clear that all the indemnities must be paid by Germany.