University:
Tyler Junior College
Course:
HIST 1301 | History
Academic year:

2024
Views:

41

Pages:

1
Author:

Dave D.

EXPANSION IN THE INDUSTRIAL AGE HIST 1301 | History France Claiming colonies in Africa has been a difficult task for France. It maintained a few trading stations in the interior and ruled the island of Gorée off the coast of Senegal. Apart from its incursion into Senegal's interior in the 1850s, it accomplished little until the end of the 1800s, when the European powers convened at the Congress of Berlin in 1878 to determine what would happen to the assets of the vanquished Ottoman Empire in North Africa. Tunisia was given to France. Tunisia has taken out large loans from European nations to finance economic growth and army modernization. Britain, France, and Italy created a committee to oversee its finances and guarantee payments after it filed for bankruptcy in 1869. Since many of its nationals now resided in Tunisia, Italy sought to win the country at the Congress of Berlin. Britain wanted French backing for its claims to the Mediterranean island of Cyprus, but it did not want Italy to dominate both sides of the Strait of Sicily, jeopardising British access to the eastern Mediterranean. Germany wanted to expand its own power in continental Europe; it wanted France to concentrate on North Africa instead. As a result, Italy was handed Tripoli, a city in Libya, while France obtained Tunisia. The French claim to Tunisia was accepted by Britain and Germany, but the Tunisians rejected this transfer of authority. An assault by Tunisians on Algeria, a French colony, in 1881 provided France with a pretext to invade Tunisia and impose a protectorate. Under this system of governance, the domestic affairs of the government of Muhammad III as-Sadiq was handled by Tunisia, while France was in charge of its defence and international relations. Quickly after learning that Belgium wanted to have neighbouring areas of Central Africa, France expanded its colonial possessions. Because to the Italian-born French naval commander Pierre Savorgnan de Brazza's travels around the region, negotiating with local monarchs and signing treaties on behalf of France, large regions of West Africa came under French administration between 1880 and 1900. The Côte d'Ivoire, Benin, Niger, Mali, Mauritania, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Republic of the Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Gabon, Burkina Faso, and Chad are among the regions that are currently states or portions of nations that were swiftly acquired by France. These colonies not only created marketplaces for manufactured goods but also generated a lot of palm oil, which was used to lubricate industrial gear. Along with Madagascar, an island off the coast of East Africa, France also seized control of French Somaliland (Djibouti). At times, such as when Brazza made a pact with King Illoh Makoko of the Bateke people in what is now the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Republic of the Congo, the French occupation of their African colonies was peaceful. Other times, it was all bloody conquest. For instance, on his march to Lake Chad through French Sudan (modernday Niger), Captain Paul Voulet gained a reputation for brutality. Villages previously ruled by the French were pillaged and their residents raped and murdered by Voulet's soldiers.