The Radiant Republic

When André attempted to forge cannon barrels in cast iron, he repeatedly impressed one point upon the armourers: the best choice was iron ore from the Scandinavian Peninsula. The reason was simple. Swedish iron ore naturally contained manganese, chromium, tungsten, molybdenum, and nickel. André knew that these five alloying additives could transform ordinary iron and steel into alloy steels with special properties—high strength, high toughness, wear resistance, corrosion resistance, low-temperature resistance, high-temperature resistance, and even non-magnetism.

Among them, manganese, tungsten, nickel, and molybdenum were all discovered or refined by Swedish scientists in the eighteenth century (the achievement of refining tungsten belonged to the Spanish). Only chromium’s discovery and refinement belonged to the contemporary French chemist Vauquelin.

In 1774, Gahn heated pyrolusite powder purified by Scheele together with charcoal in a crucible for one hour, and obtained button-like lumps of metallic manganese. Bergman named it “manganese,” with the element symbol Mn. When the manganese content in steel exceeded thirteen percent, this high-manganese steel became both hard and tough, and was easy to process in many ways.

In 1751, a Swedish scientist working in Stockholm, Alex, discovered nickel in an ore containing mixed metals, with the element symbol Ni. Four years later, in 1755, Bergman, also from Sweden, refined nickel. Metallic nickel had excellent corrosion resistance and could greatly extend an alloy’s service life.

In 1782, the Swedish scientist Hjelm obtained molybdenum by sealing and strongly heating a mixture of charcoal (bound with linseed oil) and molybdic acid. Its element symbol was Mo. It had high strength both at room temperature and at high temperatures, and also conducted heat well. In particular, alloy steels based on manganese, molybdenum, and nickel were a standard configuration for high-quality gun barrels in the Second World War.

In 1781, the Swedish chemist Scheele discovered scheelite and extracted a new elemental acid—tungstic acid. In 1783, the Spaniard de Elhuyar first obtained tungsten powder by reducing tungsten trioxide with carbon, and named the element, with the symbol W. Tungsten was mostly used to produce special steels and hard steels, including manufacturing tools such as lathe tooling, drill bits, milling cutters, wire-drawing dies, female dies and male dies, and various parts for pneumatic tools.

In February 1792, the twenty-year-old chemist Vauquelin, hired by the Reims Polytechnic Institute, conducted an inspection and study in the iron-ore districts of the Lorraine Plateau and “accidentally” discovered a new metallic element—five years earlier than in the original history.

Half a year later, when the Reims institute authorized Vauquelin to name this new element, the young scientist promptly called the grey, needle-like metal “chromium,” with the symbol Cr. Ferrochrome, as an additive to steel, could be used to produce many kinds of special steels with high strength, corrosion resistance, wear resistance, high-temperature resistance, and oxidation resistance.

With the help of the British engineer J. Bramah, who had already taken French nationality, the Reims Academy of Sciences made major progress in forging hydraulic presses. Although it would still take time before the hydraulic press could ultimately replace the time-consuming and laborious steam forging hammer, André’s existence ensured that, in the direction of major technological development, there would not be too many detours.

Now the stage was set, and only a final spark was needed. Once the basic open-hearth steelmaking method appeared, André was confident that he could use the free-shipping Meuse as the transportation hub, and with steam-powered inland cargo vessels, fuse together the Namur coal base, the Sedan steel smelter, and the Lorraine iron-ore mining company into an integrated steel-and-coal combine.

According to André’s future plan, the Sedan ironworks—first built in 1775 and expanded in 1791—would, in 1793, continue to enlarge its production scale with multiple Martin furnaces as its “divine instruments.” Sedan’s pig-iron output would rise from its current level of less than five thousand tons to one hundred and fifty thousand tons of iron and steel three years later, in 1796—or even two hundred thousand tons. In addition, André would consider establishing a special-steel smelting and processing plant in Liege, selecting high-quality ore from the Scandinavian Peninsula to produce dedicated steels for cannon barrels and gun barrels.

Meanwhile, across the Channel, Britain’s total pig-iron capacity was only one hundred and twenty-five thousand four hundred tons (a real figure for 1796), while its steel output could be ignored. As for the rest of Europe, the combined pig-iron capacity of other countries might not even match Britain alone, not to mention the south-central regions of France, which lacked iron ore.

Steel was the nation.

Only when both the total quantity and the quality of steel surpassed the British Empire would André be able to expand his forces without restraint and rapidly, and, by relying on the steel flood he controlled, crush with ease any European monarch or hostile force that dared resist him. André did not need to fear ending up like the later Emperor Napoleon, who endured countless hardships in his lifetime, sacrificed five hundred thousand French soldiers, won ninety-five percent of the major battles he fought, and yet saw everything collapse because of two or three defeats—twenty years of bitter toil, only to return in a day to where the Revolution had begun.

Besides rebuilding an extra-large steelworks at Sedan, André was also strengthening upstream and downstream resource integration. On the Lorraine Plateau in the upper reaches of the Meuse, the United Commercial Bank was taking the lead in uniting small and medium mine owners who had proactively thrown in with the United Investment Company, forming a large ore-mining company to implement a trust-like consolidation. Of course, Swedish and Norwegian ore was of even better quality. However, so long as Dutch merchants—the so-called “carriers of the sea”—continued to supply various cheap resources, André did not necessarily need to resort to violence to complete France’s “natural borders.”

Downstream, in the newly occupied Namur region, larger coal mines were already under exploration and expansion. André demanded that Namur’s metallurgical-coal output be raised within three years from the current five hundred thousand tons to more than two million tons, and that the Charleroi region’s steam coal reach one million tons. It should be noted that, in the same period in 1795, the British had already surpassed ten million tons in total coal extraction and transport. However, once the left bank of the Rhine was truly in his grasp, André would be able, in the future “Ruhr,” to open up an even grander campaign map.

On the third day after the ball, André left Liege for Brussels. Before departing, the dictator not only granted the Comtesse family participation in the production and sale of rifled firearms, but also handed to the Liege merchants’ federation—led by the armaments bureau—the procurement of Scandinavian ore and a large order for iron rails. The two small steelworks at Sedan and Chalons could no longer meet the massive rail orders issued from Reims.

Not long ago, after burning through vast sums of money, Cugnot and his engineering team finally succeeded in putting a steam locomotive onto rails (see earlier chapters). The “Cugnot steam locomotive,” consisting of only a single engine pulling one roofless carriage, barely managed to complete the full run on the experimental rail line from Chalons to Reims, a total length of fifty kilometres.

During this test run, the “Cugnot steam locomotive” not only snapped several rails, but also had to stop mid-journey for repairs four or five times due to endless mechanical failures. In the end, it took more than thirty hours to reach the final terminus—Reims. Meanwhile, over the same time and the same distance, a four-wheeled carriage could easily make several round trips between Chalons and Reims.

Just as Cugnot and his team of more than twenty mechanical engineers were sinking into despair under the mockery provoked by such an abysmal result, André returned to Reims and, at the earliest moment, went to see all members of the locomotive development group. In his personal capacity, he rewarded the entire team with fifty thousand francs, urging them to continue their efforts.

In André’s view, the fact that the “Cugnot steam locomotive” could “finish” fifty kilometres at all was a great victory of an epoch-making kind, even more important than Fulton’s steamboat. So long as the overall direction of climbing the technology tree was correct, other flaws and shortcomings could be overcome gradually through continued investment and improvement.

It was also after this inspection that André made up his mind to draft personally a plan for a “Great Northern Railway Network.” He intended, within five to ten years, to extend the rail network across all fifteen northern provinces. Beyond accelerating construction of the northern rail routes from Reims to Sedan and Charleville-Mezieres, the rails would run south from Reims toward Chalons, cross the Marne, and connect Troyes and Chaumont; to the west, they would continue to Laon, Saint-Quentin, Roye, Amiens, Arras, Lille, and the Atlantic’s right-bank ports of Calais and Dunkirk; to the east, they had to reach Verdun, Bar-le-Duc, Metz, Nancy, and, on the Rhine, Strasbourg and Colmar.

As for railway construction in the newly occupied Belgian lands and the Rhine’s west bank, André also instructed the railway working committee being organized under Say to take it into consideration at the appropriate time and include it in the plan.

After more than two years of adjustment, Say and the others almost regarded André as the God-Favoured. Any decision from the dictator—however unbelievable, however criticized—was afterward proven feasible and effective. Examples included Bordeaux mixture, cigarettes, cowpox inoculation, healthy drinking water (filtered and boiled clean water), high-pressure steam engines, steamboats, steam spinning machines, steam looms, gas streetlights, potato flour, canned food, milk powder, reinforced concrete, asphalt roads, and so on. Even when there were occasional small mistakes, they were no more than blemishes—minor issues that could be overcome or corrected.

André believed one point firmly: only high investment could bring high output.

Yet once he returned to reality, André found that, after winning the War of National Defense, he now faced a severe shortage of construction funding. Across the Channel, the English relied on attracting capital and completing one round after another of fundraising on the London exchange—fine, “financing.” André would naturally imitate it.

However, Ouvrard and the others soon told André that “Reims bonds” were not selling well in the securities markets of Paris, London, Amsterdam, and Frankfurt. Many merchants feared the northern dictator’s ability to repay. To put it more bluntly, government bonds without gold as backing were trash.

At this time, the united bank’s vault held only fifty tons of gold, which obviously could not satisfy investors’ confidence. André then had an inspiration. He thought of something the French would do in the nineteenth century: wrap large lead blocks in gold, cast them into fake “gold ingots” of two hundred kilograms apiece, store them in the vault, and periodically let investors come to admire them.

Once André handed this “Ponzi scheme” to Ouvrard to carry out, the gold reserves in the underground vault at the Bacourt camp rose from the original fifty tons to two hundred and fifty tons (and would become five hundred tons in the future). Only then did brokers in various places begin actively selling Reims construction bonds “backed by gold.”

Of course, the risk of the fraud being exposed existed, but so long as André did not fall from power, that possibility was vanishingly small. As the victor, no one would openly question his creditworthiness or his ability to repay. Even if a run occurred, he could imitate the Bank of France or the Bank of England and suspend gold redemption for thirty years. And if André failed, it would naturally mean death and extermination for his entire clan—then everything would be moot, and who would care that floods might engulf the future.

…

At dawn, Marshal André stepped out of the city of Liege and stood on a patch of open ground outside the Army of the North’s prisoner camp. Before him stood more than twenty officers from the former Bohemian corps or the former Austrian Netherlands forces, newly dressed in blue uniforms and lined up in orderly ranks. Scharnhorst, a Hanoverian, was among them.

Most of these officers came from impoverished commoner families or bankrupt noble houses. They could not pay the exorbitant self-ransom, and their old employer, the Austrian monarch, would not pay to redeem high-ranking mercenaries either. Thus they proactively chose to “switch jobs” into the French order of battle, working for a new employer who offered generous pay.

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Before long, the Army of the North’s gendarmerie commander, Colonel Wade, stepped forward. In a loud voice, he ordered the officers to imitate his movements: raise their right hands level, clenched into fists, face Marshal André, and swear allegiance.

“Repeat after me!” As he spoke, Colonel Wade turned to face André and raised his right hand.

“I, Pierre Wade (each oath-taker states his own name), solemnly swear before God that I shall, without reservation, be loyal to André Franck, the supreme commander of the army; that I shall obey the orders of the superiors appointed by Marshal André; that I shall keep faith, in the name of a brave soldier, even unto sacrifice without hesitation. Long live André!”

Swearing allegiance was a mandatory onboarding procedure for newly appointed officers after the War of National Defense. Before this, each new officer also had to sign an oath document with identical content, kept on file at the Reims gendarmerie headquarters. Once anyone violated it, he would certainly be sent by the gendarmerie to a court-martial and tried.

Unless André issued an order relieving the oath-taker of all military posts, the above oath would automatically remain in force. Otherwise, even after retirement, the sworn officer could not violate the pledge he had once made: to be loyal without reservation and to serve the supreme Marshal André.

Although André had “borrowed” the German Wehrmacht’s oath to Hitler, it did not feel out of place in the eighteenth century either. In fact, whether in republican armies or monarchic armies across Europe, such a ceremony existed; revolutionary France merely changed the object of the oath to “Mother France,” while André assumed the role of “Father Frank.” France and Frank meant the same thing: France.

Naturally, this oath was also two-way. Under God’s witness, the oath-taker and the sovereign he served formed a sacred contract. André had to pay sufficient compensation for this loyalty, including abolishing self-ransom, granting treatment and promotion conditions equal to French officers, caring for the families of subordinates, and…

The journey from Liege to Brussels was only a little more than one hundred kilometres, yet André travelled slowly by carriage, taking in the scenery along the way. From time to time he also went incognito. Under the gendarmerie’s discreet protection, he visited towns and villages to inspect how the “Low Countries French-speaking region’s” policy of exchanging land for military service was being implemented.

Evidently, the land policy was working very well. Everywhere large numbers of young men actively registered, hoping to join the Army of Belgium then under formation. The Austrian Netherlands was itself part of the same French-speaking region, and its people were mostly Catholic, making integration with the French extremely high.

Since the war broke out in April this year, at least within Belgium, there had essentially been no severe incidents of local armed resistance against the French. At most there were one or two rural nobles, under the instigation of a stubborn archbishop, throwing themselves like moths into a flame and bringing destruction upon themselves. In fact, before the gendarmerie even sent men to suppress them, these resisting nobles or bishops had already been arrested by the newly established National Guard, and then became “gifts” offered to please Marshal André.

According to the general staff’s plan, the future Army of Belgium would be only a second-rate garrison corps, with its strength kept at around twenty thousand men. In addition, André had instructed the Chief of Staff, General Berthier, to use the winter training period, when there would be no fighting, to complete a new round of major military system adjustments before March next year.

There were two key points. First, André proposed adding a large formation above the existing armies: an army group. Second, all armies in the future would be referred to as “armies,” or “army groups.”

Under normal circumstances, an army group would be a combined-arms formation mixing infantry, cavalry, artillery, and other supporting branches, with a strength of around thirty-five thousand men. The highest commander at the army-group level would be called the army commander, and his rank would generally be Lieutenant General. A reserve army would be organized at twenty thousand men, and its commander could be a major general or a Lieutenant General.

As for an army group, André defined it as a strategic operational formation of combined arms. It would be an army-level organization formed by several army groups together with combat and service-support forces. It would be the highest operational formation under the command headquarters. The commander of an army group would uniformly be called the commanding general, with the rank of General. It should be noted that “General” had originally been an honorary rank for royal nobles, and later had become a rank used mainly in the navy.

An army-group commanding general would not remain long at a forward headquarters. He would usually stay at the Northern Command Headquarters base, mainly at Sedan and Reims. Only when major operations approached would the army-group commanding general accept appointment by the supreme command headquarters—Marshal André—and, according to the general staff’s overall plan, lead a professional staff team to the front and command two or more army groups in battle.

André envisaged that the current six armies—the four field armies, the Army of the Rhine, the Army of the North, the Army of the Moselle, and the Army of the Meuse, plus two local garrison armies under preparation, including the Army of Belgium and the German corps (there would be more garrison armies in the future)—would all be reorganized uniformly as army groups.

In the process, the total establishment of the four field army groups would be reduced to one hundred and forty thousand men. Adding the two reserve corps’ forty thousand men and a guard division of twenty thousand men, the total forces under the Northern Command Headquarters would still remain at two hundred thousand men. However, thirty thousand men among the active forces would retire. This figure already deducted those officers and non-commissioned officers assigned specifically to the guard division and to serve in the two local garrison armies, as well as some soldiers who retired early due to disability.

These thirty thousand retired soldiers would carry their honors and a franc cheque in their pockets, and would be placed in the National Guard of the fifteen northern provinces, militia and other reserve organizations, or serve as town police. Their pay would not be much worse than before in the field armies, but more importantly, these thirty thousand retired soldiers would directly obtain more than fifty thousand hectares of fertile land—confiscated church property or assets seized from émigré noble rebels.

André was certain that the existence of these thirty thousand loyal soldiers who guarded their homes would be enough to ensure that the northern provinces would face no military threat from Paris. At that time, with a single order from the Northern Command Headquarters, these retired veterans could assemble an army of one hundred and fifty thousand men within a few days and march on Paris in immense columns. Likewise, they could also handle future threats from the seas to the east or the west.

In truth, André’s considerations were somewhat excessive. In Berthier’s view, it would be enough to send a small force south from the Soissons camp and make a symbolic threat to the eastern plains centered on Meaux, throwing into unrest the grain-producing region that supplied fifty percent of the capital’s wheat. Then a hungry Paris would have no choice but to seek compromise.

…

Major Scharnhorst, who had publicly sworn and formally joined the French army, followed André as a newly appointed officer of the general staff. When Chief of Staff Berthier remained at the command headquarters base in Sedan, this staff major needed to accompany the supreme commander at all times, performing duties similar to those of a minister of war.

At least at the beginning, André and Scharnhorst spoke quite congenially. André admired the other man’s military professionalism, while the major was astonished by the commander’s breadth of knowledge and versatility. In later generations, German officers were best at playing the piano, French officers were best at poetry and speeches, and Russian soldiers could not be officers unless they could dance.

Scharnhorst lived up to his reputation as the founder of the German general staff. He was well versed in European military systems and the history of war. He summarized the factors behind the many victories of the September War of National Defense: the assistance of harsh weather, the high quality of officers and men, an efficient intelligence system, excellent artillery performance, and superb war mobilization.

But the most important point, he said, was the French Northern Command Headquarters’ precise grasp of changes in the situation—astonishing to behold. From beginning to end, André held the rhythm of the war firmly in his hands, forcing the Duc de Brunswick and his Prussian corps to close their eyes and jump in, even while knowing that traps lay ahead.

In response, André accepted the Hanoverian’s compliments with a show of restraint, yet always smiled without explaining. This, of course, could not be explained. If the other party had been the public or politicians, André could have bragged at random. But facing a genuine military expert, André knew he could not keep talking nonsense. He ended this rather troublesome conversation with an arrogant expression that said, “I am the God-Favoured; it is only natural that I should win.”

To be frank, André preferred having Colonel Suchet as a staff companion rather than holding a dull conversation with Major Scharnhorst every day, the topic always dreary military matters. It was as if, in Scharnhorst’s entire life, there was nothing to do but war. Look at Blucher: if he was not fighting on the battlefield, he was back on his estate sowing seed among village girls and older women. Kutuzov was similar—often with two prostitutes in his arms, drunk as a lord, running onto the battlefield to look for the enemy…

A week ago, the somewhat impulsive Suchet had volunteered to be assigned down to the Army of the North, hoping to serve alongside Brigadier General Pichegru of the Second Infantry Brigade as the brigade’s deputy commander in the rank of Colonel. Yet two days later, André decided instead to send Colonel Suchet to the Army of the Moselle as Deputy Chief of Staff under General Custine.

Frankly speaking, Deputy Chief of Staff of the Army of the Moselle held far more real power than a deputy brigade commander. But Suchet was not happy about it. He even actively lobbied General Hoche of the Army of the North, hoping the commander could influence André’s decision. Hoche, however, poured a bucket of cold water over the Lyonnais officer’s head.

All those who had risen together from Bordeaux and belonged to the old Champagne Composite Regiment, having endured to this day, were already brothers who entrusted their lives to one another. As the supreme commander’s absolute confidant, Hoche told Suchet bluntly, “In fact, the commander does not trust General Pichegru. In the gendarmerie headquarters’ internal assessment, his loyalty to the supreme commander is not high. As for the rest, I advise you not to look into it. Knowing too much will harm your career.”

There was also a detail Hoche did not state outright. During the liberation of Brussels and the siege of Antwerp, Pichegru had, on several occasions, privately contacted the heir of the Prince of Conde— the young Duc d'Enghien—who had fled abroad. As an active-duty officer, such conduct was a serious disciplinary offense. Under internal regulations, Pichegru should have been removed from command and sent to the Reims gendarmerie headquarters for a thorough investigation.

However, the gendarmerie could not uncover any conspiracy or transaction between Pichegru and the young Duc d'Enghien. The only thing they could confirm was that Pichegru opposed extreme revolutionaries. While serving in the Army of the Rhine, he not only sheltered capable noble officers under his command, but also allowed wounded prisoners, after signing written pledges, to cross the Rhine. Yet these actions had afterward been tacitly approved by the army commander, General Kellermann, and strictly speaking did not constitute a violation.

When this thorny matter landed on the northern commander’s desk, André also lamented how rare talent was. After weighing it, he rescinded the request submitted by Colonel Wade, the Army of the North gendarmerie commander, for an arrest-and-review order, and limited the measure to continued surveillance. By regulation, arresting and interrogating a commander at brigade or division level—a general—required Marshal André’s prior signature and approval. In an emergency, the gendarmerie could inform the relevant army commander, reassign the suspect, and place him under soft detention. But without André’s authorization, no one could initiate interrogation of a general under suspicion.

For this reason, André would not let the highly promising Suchet jump into this fire pit. Words like traitor and rebellion were absolute taboos in any army. Once Pichegru were confirmed to have participated in an émigré noble plot, he would face a court-martial, and even Suchet, as an associate, would find it difficult to escape unscathed.

From two years ago onward, the officers and men of the Champagne Composite Regiment had bound their interests to André himself. If anyone disgraced the whole group, the officer corps would still investigate and impeach him. Even André, as supreme commander, could not easily shield someone who had committed offenses. Even Chief of Staff Berthier had once been hollowed out by the officer corps within the staff, and had sat on the sidelines for nearly half a year.

Had it not been for the fact that, in the end, a thoroughly awakened Berthier truly threw in with André through his actions—taking part in the “June operation” to pursue the fleeing king and purge the Royalist Party’s influence in the Marne, and also marrying Maria, the eldest daughter of General Brice, commander of the Ardennes National Guard (formerly a Lieutenant Colonel of the Reims National Guard, and among the earliest Reims officials to pledge themselves to André)—he might long since have been kicked back by the gendarmerie to Versailles to live out his days.

In addition, on the list of suspects watched by General Chasse, the gendarmerie commander, there was also the newly promoted Brigadier General Jean-Victor Moreau. Strictly speaking, General Moreau himself had no problems. The problem lay with his wife, who came from an aristocratic family associated with the Royalist Party. While Moreau served in the Army of the Rhine, his wife, at another’s request, had attempted to persuade her husband to use his good relationship with Marshal André to secretly rescue an aristocratic officer of the former emigrant contingent from the prisoner camp. Although Moreau refused, he also did not report the matter to the gendarmerie.

Not long ago, that captured rebel officer, because his charges were relatively minor, was sentenced by a military tribunal to one year of forced labor. Yet the pampered aristocrat, trying to evade hard labor, went to the gendarmerie and confessed that Moreau’s wife had attempted to rescue him. A few days earlier, André, likewise citing the rarity of talent, refused the corps gendarmerie’s request to interrogate Moreau’s wife, agreeing only to continued surveillance of the Moreau family members, especially his wife’s branch of the family.

Under normal circumstances, André rarely interfered in gendarmerie actions. But Moreau and Pichegru had far-reaching influence in the history of France’s foreign wars, and André did not wish to waste their military gifts. After all, the gendarmerie had still not obtained conclusive evidence proving that the two generals had committed treason.