A New Model of Colonial Enterprise (2)

To watch several thousand people march in formation through a city is, in itself, a spectacle so striking it etches itself into memory for a lifetime. And if those thousands happen to be dressed in something approaching a uniform—ceremonial kit or proper military dress—well, words fail entirely. One's jaw simply hangs open.

What was more, they moved with the snap and precision of a regular army: crisp drill, driving strides, and a confidence so abundant they felt not the slightest shame in belting out a marching song loud enough to shake a city still half-lost in morning sleep.

Picture them now. Every man clad head to toe in black, like a flock of crows, a blood-red armband blazing on each sleeve. That is the spectacle currently unfolding before the eyes of Lucius Foote, the United States Minister to Korea, and Collin de Plancy, Minister of France.

The Vanguard had taken it upon themselves to serve as the city's alarm clock, raising their voices at the top of their lungs toward citizens who had not yet escaped the pull of their beds.

The red-armbanded Vanguard came marching straight through the heart of the city, and the townspeople—who had slept in, yesterday ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠having been a holiday—stumbled out of their doors, rubbing their eyes in alarm. The expressions were, almost without exception, some variation of What in the world is this? or They're at that shit again.

Merchants who had risen early to prepare their stalls startled so badly they nearly fell over backward, scrambling to drag their carts and display boards out of the procession's path. Rickshaw pullers and coachmen grumbled as they yielded the road.

And yet the men at the head of the column carried themselves as if such disruption, such deference, were nothing more than their due. A standard-bearer with a red banner fixed to his staff, and beside him a Vanguard trooper holding the national flag aloft with a look of genuine reverence, strode through the streets with magnificent composure, waking the city's late sleepers as they went.

With a song, of course.

Like a diligent farmer reporting to his fields at first light to pull the weeds, the military band at the head of the column—drums, gongs, and trumpets in full cry, standard-bearers beside them—sowed grandeur and a measure of dread down every street and alley, then vanished onward. In their wake came the Vanguard itself, a tide of red and black that kindled a quiet, simmering fear, half-threatening the city's residents out of their beds. The unspoken pressure in their eyes—get to work, now—was thrown in for free.

The funny thing was that the threat had worked. Only a few months ago this capital, unlike the countryside, had not truly come alive until around midday. Now, true to the revolutionary government's motto of a new nation, a new people, everything rose early. The city had become a place of earnest, industrious motion.

Watching it all, the two foreigners wore the same mixture of curiosity, astonishment, and frank bewilderment. And in the end, the feeling resolved into a single shared conclusion.

What kind of country is this, anyway?

"I swear I'll never understand this place," Minister Foote said. His voice was mild, almost flat, as he watched the whole procession through the window. The mildness itself was the point. It meant this was not a spectacle reserved for this morning alone. It meant he had already spent a great many hours turning the thing over, hunting for some rationale behind these very public performances, and had at last issued a declaration of surrender to his former, more inquisitive self. In short, Minister Foote no longer wished to spend his time trying to comprehend the not-particularly-ordinary behavior of the Korean people.

Or, more accurately: he had grown far too busy to spare the hours even if he had wanted to.

Minister Plancy, who had been listening to this complaint in attentive silence, took a sip of the coffee a member of the American legation staff had poured for him and offered a sympathetic murmur.

"People in a group always grow bolder. Most of the time it ends in ruin—recklessness and selfishness. But I must say, I've never heard a newspaper or a scrap of public opinion claiming the Red Guard has actually given ordinary citizens any trouble."

"You call them the Red Guard too? For heaven's sake. Those red armbands of theirs are distinctive, I'll grant you—striking, even. But the uniforms are pure crow-black. Call them the Black Guard if you must. Red Guard, honestly..."

Foote kept repeating for heaven's sake and honestly until, in the end, he had to stroke his own beard simply to shut himself up. He had caught the habit from the Koreans, that endless clucking of the tongue. Damn, but the Korean language had a peculiar way of getting under a man's skin.

"The phrase Red Guard does rather stick to the tongue, you know. And as a pretext for putting the fear of God into one's enemies, it is not without a certain effectiveness."

"Hnh."

Lately, following the fashion of the streets, more and more people had taken to calling the Vanguard the Red Guard, just as Plancy did—never mind that the unit already had a perfectly serviceable name. The reason was obvious enough: those red armbands, impossible to miss, strapped bright against every forearm.

Foote watched the procession in silence for a moment longer—the armbands lettered Fulfill the Revolutionary Cause! or Long Live the Three Principles of the People!—then stepped back from the window and shook his ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠head.

"As a free-spirited American, I find that eerie streak in this country a little hard to take. All that mass drill, as if it had always been there, as natural as breathing. This was a monarchy until a few days ago, was it not?"

"It was."

"Exactly! That's what I can't wrap my head around. A crowd march like that takes thorough training and iron discipline. From what I hear, those people are all volunteers and civic servants. No military veterans among them—and they still pull off a parade that looks like the army, all from civilian stock."

"Well, it may simply be a national characteristic. The world is full of peoples, each with their own peculiarities, wouldn't you say?"

"That's true enough, but still..."

While the two of them talked, the Vanguard's column had already receded into the distance, shrinking to specks before it vanished down the far end of an alley.

With the subject of conversation gone, Foote—who had, after all, received Plancy at the American legation at this ungodly hour—cleared his throat and steered them toward the matter at hand.

"That 'new colonial enterprise' His Excellency the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Tongnyeong summoned you to discuss."

"Yes. There was such a conversation."

Plancy inclined his head at Foote's words. He wore the look of a man who had found the Tongnyeong's proposal rather to his liking.

"It seems the offer held considerable charm for your country. For us Americans—who have, as yet, nothing resembling an overseas colony to put on display—it was a somewhat tepid proposition."

"Is that so? Then you must have arranged a meeting with His Excellency after I did."

Foote dropped onto the sofa opposite him and opened his mouth.

"I heard it myself last night. A private audience, in his office, beforehand."

"Ah, so you heard yesterday. That will make this easier. I came pounding on your door at this hour precisely to discuss the matter with you. The proposal hasn't been laid out in exact terms, but I needed to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠hear it for myself before I could get a feel for the thing."

"My thought exactly."

Plancy rubbed his hands together, pleased that the conversation would now come easily, set down his coffee cup, and drew a bundle of papers from the leather satchel he had carried in under his arm.

"Take these."

"What am I looking at?"

They were copies—the product of legal consultations with the secretary attached to the French legation, with every passage that wanted revision, and every subject politically sensitive at home or abroad, already sorted and marked.

"We've noted every objection and every suspicion that can reasonably be raised at the legation level. Given the constraints of time, I imagined you would have had little opportunity to confer with your own secretaries. You are welcome to review our findings first."

"Ah. I am truly grateful for the courtesy—yours and your country's. To go to such trouble at this hour of the morning..."

"Not at all. Between us, what possible imposition could there be?"

Plancy's habit of preaching, at every conceivable opportunity, the eternal friendship and alliance of the three nations could be a little much. But the French, for all that, were forever extending this sort of consideration and convenience, and Foote, rather than open his mouth, merely nodded. It was easier on the nerves that way.

While Foote unfolded the copies Plancy had handed him and ran his eye over the passages marked in red ink and struck through with horizontal lines, Plancy sipped his coffee and went on.

"It may be a piece of the Korean government's grand design—or of His Excellency the Tongnyeong's personal vision. Either way, the new colonial enterprise they contemplate rests, in essence, on three pillars."

"Mm. I thought as much."

Foote, still turning pages, kept his eyes on the report and merely pursed his lips at Plancy's even tone.

"A protectorate, then. No—wait. They insist on guaranteeing complete independence and full autonomy in domestic politics, so that word doesn't fit either. Something like a European reinterpretation of the traditional East Asian diplomatic order, perhaps?"

"One could see it that way, but the difference is greater than you'd think. Granted, with the proper explanations and negotiations between the two countries, one might gain considerable access even in the counterpart's diplomacy and national defense. But they argue that thorough restriction is precisely what one must avoid. If the colonial population comes to believe its autonomy has been completely sealed off, that path leads straight to resistance. And if you examine the colonial rebellions that have actually occurred, and the disturbances that followed them, His Excellency's argument becomes rather more persuasive."

"Colonial rebellion..."

Foote turned the words rebellion and resistance over on his tongue a few times, his lips twitching, then shook his head. There had been no particular trouble at home—not yet. But if one recalled the Indian Wars and the realities of westward expansion, the Tongnyeong's claim was not far wrong.

The Indians were expelled, or else confined to designated tracts, and once the transcontinental railroad went through the whole board tilted. But the overseas markets and colonial enterprises still to come have already been claimed, every last one of them, by the Europeans.

To Foote's American mind—or, if one insisted on ranking the thing—there was little to distinguish Great Britain, which held the most colonies overseas, from the French Republic, which held the second most. But this time was different. If, under the pretext of a new colonial model, the government of the French Republic established not colonies of its own but new protectorates or satellite states in the territories it meant to tear from the Indochina Peninsula or southern China, and held those states under its jurisdiction—then the story changed entirely.

Far better, after all, to seize the chance to expand one's markets under the familiar and inescapable banner of alliance than to watch a territory organized as a colony and find every other nation's commercial access shut out at the source. If that opportunity existed, one could hardly support it too eagerly.

Then it would be Liaodong and Manchuria, and Taiwan besides, and Indochina, and southern China on top of it. In that case even the State Department might push a troop-dispatch bill through Congress with some real conviction.

The military decision to send troops had come later than one might have liked—a grave resolution, and a slow one. But under the framework of the Tripartite Alliance, there was money enough to throw around for the sake of saving face with both partners.

A million dollars to the Korean government, and at least three million to France?

The two countries differed in economic scale and in international standing; a difference in compensation and in the keeping of appearances was inevitable. The French, moreover, were a proud people by nature, and Foote could not help worrying they might sneer at the whole business as the arrogant American habit of trying to solve everything with money.

But if one framed it as a subscription and a patronage society—compensation, so named, for the market access they had been promised, and for the economic privileges guaranteed under the alliance in Liaodong and Manchuria—the picture looked rather handsome. Which left only the question of where the money would come from.

Morgan and Ford will take care of it.

If they didn't, it only meant the bellies of America's own corporations and magnates were already too full. Foote set the problem of the money aside, trusting the trusts to find the tap. Plancy, sensing that his counterpart was still turning the new colonial model over in his mind, pressed on without pause.

"The advantage in cost reduction is greater than one might think. Consider, if nothing else, Britain's Sepoy Mutiny. The consequences were catastrophic—so much so that the result, today, is that Britain stripped the East India Company of its autonomy. A company policy that ignored the home government's directives brought on a far greater disaster, and in the end it was the taxpayers' blood-money that filled the hole."

Plancy was not wrong. The Company's failure to prevent the Sepoy Mutiny—or, more precisely, its failure to manage cultural and religious difference with any care—had been the cause of a catastrophe that left the Indian market, the most vital industrial foundation of the British Empire, half a vegetable. It had ended with the Company itself stripped of self-rule. The fact that the East India Company had been permitted to go on trading under its own name afterward owed much to a frightened British government and Parliament, already staring down an agricultural depression, a fight over the Corn Laws, a general slump, and a collapsing stock market, who had poured in the taxpayers' precious money to keep the concern alive. Even so.

The truth was that the choice colonial lands—the golden geese that laid eggs even if one left them alone—had long since been claimed by the great powers. What remained were the relatively poorer prospects. Among those, one had to pick the wheat from the chaff, find a use for each, and consign it to a method of management that actually fit. That was the Korean government's argument, and Foote clicked his tongue over it.

"Hnh. So resistance is a given, and the idea is to design, before the colony is even established, a means of shrinking its scale or preventing it altogether."

"Precisely! That's it exactly. And not in some vague way—by thoroughly mastering each country's culture, its racial diversity, its domestic politics, and planning against all of it. And then, the great belt that binds the whole thing together, the crystallized form of the Tripartite Alliance—"

Foote was coming around; one could see the appetite growing in him. Plancy himself, caught up in the charm of the business model, was winding up a flourish of rhetoric, on the verge of letting slip a glimpse of the Korean government's vast ideals and designs—when a figure scarcely half their height, a retinue trailing behind him, burst in and cut them off.

"Wh— Your Excellency!"

It was me.