The Haiti Question

Jacob Gollen and his group did indeed own a large tract of land in Louisiana. In fact, land in Louisiana was practically worthless. What was lacking there was never land, but people.

In 1762, France and Spain united to resist Britain expansion in North America. As part of the alliance, the France transferred sovereignty of Louisiana to the Spain. From that time on, the Spain became the masters of Louisiana.

However, the Spain have always had a problem: a limited population. Therefore, they couldn't provide many immigrants. So, although Louisiana was Spain territory, its immigrant population was still predominantly France.

After the France Revolution, Spain briefly joined the Anti-French Alliance and fought against France, but quickly switched sides and became an ally of France. Louisiana, on the other hand, remained a Spain colony, but was still predominantly French-speaking.

The Spain have recently encountered some economic difficulties (it seems the Spain are never truly free from economic hardship), and they are also facing considerable pressure from the United States in North America. In Florida, the United States have begun to engage in some underhanded tactics, while in Louisiana, the capital of the United States, the United States exploited the Spain's weakness to force them to acknowledge the United States 'Spain "special interests" in New Orleans.

The increasingly weakened Spain were finding it increasingly difficult to maintain control over the vast territory of Louisiana. Napoleon seized the opportunity to offer the Spain a deal: to exchange some of his interests in Italy for sovereignty over Louisiana.

Napoleon envisioned maintaining considerable influence in the New World by utilizing Louisiana and Haiti, which was still under France control. This vision was supported by Joseph, compared to most people at the time, was far more aware of the New World's significance for the future.

To strengthen control over Louisiana, population was paramount. However, the France had been living comfortably for some time, and far fewer were genuinely willing to venture thousands of miles away. Therefore, the number of France immigrants was limited. Although the Napoleon government consistently encouraged childbirth, and the Ministry of Truth even awarded "Heroic Mother" medals to mothers with many children, this could not change the situation in the short term.

Therefore, the France nowadays mainly rely on immigrants from other parts of Europe to move to Louisiana.

Of course, theoretically speaking, ensuring that immigrants are mainly France should better guarantee cohesion between overseas territories and the homeland. However, the events of the North America Revolutionary War also show that blood ties alone are not reliable. Moreover, unlike Napoleon hoped for a new British empire, Joseph's expectations were much lower; his minimum expectation was simply a fragmented North America continent.

Moreover, Joseph believed that because of the presence of the United States, Louisiana was, in a sense, more likely to be loyal to France, just as Canada had always been loyal to Britain because of the presence of the United States.

With the United States in control, it seems quite feasible to control Louisiana, thousands of miles away. Of course, to achieve this, it would be necessary to create economic conflict between Louisiana and the United States.

This isn't difficult. The current United States economy relies heavily on grain and cotton exports. Louisiana can produce these too, and as long as Louisiana focuses on production, it will create conflict with the United States. Furthermore, historically, the American North will likely pursue industrial development in the future, and the continuous export of cheap manufactured goods to the United States through Louisiana, both legally and illegally, will create another conflict. With all these factors in place, a divided North America is entirely foreseeable.

However, to achieve all this, especially to maintain long-term control over Louisiana, there was one problem that had to be solved: Haiti, then known as Saint-Domingue.

Because in later generations, Haiti was one of the poorest countries in the world, with a low profile. Unless a major earthquake occurred, most people wouldn't even know that such a country existed. So initially, Joseph didn't pay much attention to Haiti.

But Joseph soon realized that Haiti in this era was not an insignificant place at all; in fact, in terms of its current significance to the France economy, it was even more important than the whole of Louisiana.

In 1780, 40% of the sugar and 60% of the coffee on the Europe market came from Haiti. Haiti produced more of these agricultural products than the entire West Indies combined. By 1791, Haiti had become the world's leading producer of sugar. Haiti became one of France's wealthiest colonies and was known as a "pearl" of the Caribbean Sea Haiti.

Of course, Haiti's wealth had absolutely nothing to do with the majority of Haiti. On the contrary, it was precisely because of Haiti's wealth that Haiti slave owners had a stronger desire to drive their enslaved people to perform arduous labor. Compared to slaves in the American South, the labor intensity of Haiti enslaved people was almost comparable to that of Britain workers.

In 1791, taking advantage of the France Revolution, Haiti slaves launched a major uprising. Initially, the rebels allied with Britain and Spain against the France Anti-French Alliance, and later joined forces with the France against the Spain and Britain. To ensure Haiti remained part of France, the revolutionary government even took a move that shocked all of Europe: emancipating the slaves, granting Black people citizenship and voting rights, and appointing the Black rebel leader Toussaint Louverture as governor of Saint-Domingue.

But this did not solve the most fundamental problem—the land problem. Therefore, under the jurisdiction of the France revolutionary government, the black people of Haiti suddenly evolved from "private slaves" to "free slaves," or rather, "Free agricultural workers." All the developed land in Haiti belonged to white people, and the situation of black people after obtaining so-called "citizenship" was even worse than before the revolution.

In the original historical account, in 1801, the black leader Toussaint declared Haiti's independence, abolished slavery, and nationalized the lands of the white colonists. Napoleon then dispatched a 30,000-strong expeditionary force under the command of Leclerc in 1802 to attempt to retake Haiti. However, the expeditionary force's operations in Haiti were unsuccessful. Coupled with the spread of yellow fever and the various forms of United States support for the Haiti rebels (from material aid to naval bombardment of the French Army), the French Army was in a precarious situation. Even though Leclerc used deception to lure Toussaint into negotiations and subsequently arrested him, the Haiti rebels still gained the upper hand and forced the remaining French Army to surrender in 1803, thus establishing the first independent black republic.

However, after the establishment of the independent Black Republic, Haiti's former wealth seemed to vanish with the departure of the colonizers. Haiti quickly became one of the poorest and most underdeveloped countries in the world, a situation that remains true to this day, despite having almost the same system and laws as the United States.

This outcome naturally led many Yehe Tribe members, who were considered "white" by their ideology, to conclude that "white people are superior, black people are inferior, and without the leadership of excellent white people, black people can only make a mess of themselves." Similar "evidence" included absurd claims such as "Mandela turned South Africa from a developed country into a China country." (When these Yehe people considered South Africa a developed country, they probably only counted white people as human beings, while declaring black people human. According to their calculations, India would also be a developed country.)

Haiti's "decline"—let me call it "decline" for now, although in fact even when Haiti was at its most "prosperous," a black person would not have lived a better life than during the "decline" period—is actually very simple: it was originally just a highly substitutable link in the economic chain. When it gained independence, it not only became independent politically, but it was also economically deprived of its independence.

Or to put it more bluntly, it was isolated from the colonial economic chain. Its position in this chain was quickly replaced by other colonies. And the production costs of other colonies were certainly far lower than Haiti's —unless, after independence, Haiti could still consolidate its land and use the black people as "free slaves." But if that happened, what would be the point of the revolution?

However, for France and for Napoleon's dream of a new, unshakeable empire, the defeat in Haiti was decisive. Losing Haiti not only caused him enormous economic losses (although this was somewhat mitigated by demanding ransom from the Republic of Haiti), but also deprived him of a crucial foothold in the Americas. This is one of the reasons why Napoleon later readily sold Louisiana entirely to the United States.

Today, in this same time and space, the same problem of Haiti faced Napoleon.

"Saint-Domingue is bound to cause trouble sooner or later." Napoleon knew this very well. "That Toussaint Louverture is practically the Haiti. Hmm, Joseph, what was that you said?"

"The mountains are high and the emperor is far away," Joseph replied.

"Yes, 'the mountains are high and the emperor is far away.' It's too far from France here. I just received a report that Toussaint has started some kind of 'land nationalization,' which is basically buying back white people's land. Damn it, five centimes per acre, that's confiscation. Many France people have been forced to flee, or even killed. What do you think we should do?" Napoleon said.

According to Joseph's upbringing, he should applaud Haiti's righteous anti-colonial actions. However, this approach harms the interests of the France —or, to put it more bluntly, the interests of the Bonaparte family! Therefore, if the matter could be resolved simply by suppressing the uprising, Joseph would certainly wholeheartedly support the direct suppression of the Haiti rebellion.

But could the suppression succeed? Joseph couldn't help but ask himself this question.

Steamships couldn't reach Haiti, where the Britain and United States held the naval advantage. Joseph wondered what he would do if he were Britain or United States and discovered the France fighting the Haiti Black insurgents.

"They'll do exactly what we did in Ireland in Haiti," Joseph immediately concluded. "With these guys involved, this war is a bottomless pit, a quagmire, and we absolutely cannot get stuck in it."