In a Paris newspaper Poincaré published in September, 1921, some strictly reserved documents on the questions of the military guarantees and the occupation of the left bank of the Rhine. He wished to get the credit of having stood firm when Clemenceau himself hesitated at the demand for an occupation of the left bank of the Rhine for even a longer period than fifteen years. He has published the letter he sent to Clemenceau to be shown to Wilson and Lloyd George and the latter's reply.
He said that there must be no thought of giving up the occupation and renouncing a guarantee until every obligation in the treaty should have been carried out; he went so far as to claim that in occupation regarded as a guarantee of a credit representing an indemnity for damages, there is nothing contrary to the principles proclaimed by President Wilson and recognized by the Allies. Nor would it suffice even to have the faculty of reoccupation, because "this faculty" could never be a valid substitute for occupation. As regards the suggestion that a long occupation or one for an indeterminate period would cause bad feeling, M. Poincaré was convinced that this was an exaggeration. A short occupation causes more irritation on account of its arbitrary limit; everyone understands an occupation without other limit than the complete carrying out of the treaty. The longer the time that passes the better would become the relations between the German populations and the armies of occupation.
Clemenceau communicated Poincaré's letter to Lloyd George. The British Prime Minister replied on May 6 in the clearest terms. In his eyes, forcing Germany to submit to the occupation of the Rhine and the Rhine Provinces for an unlimited period, was a provocation to renew the war in Europe.
During the Conference France put forward some proposals the aim of which was nothing less than to split up Germany. A typical example is the memorandum presented by the French delegation claiming the annexation of the Saar territory. This is completely German; in the six hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants before the War there were not a hundred French. Not a word had ever been said about annexation of the Saar either in Government pronouncements or in any vote in the French Parliament, nor had it been discussed by any political party. No one had ever suggested such annexation, which certainly was a far more serious thing than the annexation of Alsace-Lorraine to Germany, as there was considerable German population in Alsace-Lorraine. There was no French population at all in the Saar, and the territory in question could not even be claimed for military reasons but only for its economic resources. Reasons of history could not count, for they were all in Germany's favour. Nevertheless the request was put forward as a matter of sentiment. Had not the Saar belonged in other days entirely or in part to France? Politics and economics are not everything, said Clemenceau; history also has great value. For the United States a hundred and twenty years are a long time; for France they count little. Material reparations are not enough, there must be moral reparations too, and the conception of France cannot be the same as that of her Allies. The desire for the Saar responded, according to Clemenceau, to a need of moral reparation. On this point, too, the extreme French claim was modified. The Saar mines were given to France, not provisionally as a matter of reparations, but permanently with full right of possession and full guarantees for their working. For fifteen years from the date of the treaty the government of the territory was put in the hands of the League of Nations as trustee; after fifteen years the population, entirely German, should be called to decide under what government they desired to live. In other words, in a purely German country, which no one in France had ever claimed, of which no one in France had ever spoken during the War, the most important property was handed to a conquering State, the country was put under the administration of the conquerors (which is what the League of Nations actually is at present), and after fifteen years of torment the population is to be put through a plebiscite. Meanwhile the French douane rules in the Saar.