Indemnity.

This is coolbert:

Here with a subject most germane after the devastating Haitian earthquake, the enormous loss of life and impoverishment of the people, prolonged and abusive, never-ending. An impoverishment in part due to WAR INDEMNITY!

"War reparations refers to the monetary compensation intended to cover damage or injury during a war"

Reparations often referred to as INDEMNITY! Punitive monetary measures taken against the vanquished by the victor. "Pay for the cost of the war, the damage, and then some!"

War reparations having to be paid - - indemnity - - one of the most egregious in history, if not the most egregious, as a result of the successful Haitian slave rebellion against French rule! In this case, the victors having to pay the vanquished, so desirous was the independent Haitian nation for international and diplomatic recognition.

The French, demanding and receiving agreement on the part of the Haitians to pay an indemnity, reparations for lost territory, investment, life and limb, etc. AN INDEMNITY AGREED TO ONLY UNDER DURESS, WITH FRENCH NAVAL VESSELS OFFSHORE, READY TO FIRE!!

"The Haiti indemnity controversy refers to events surrounding the 1825 demand by France for a FR?150 million indemnity (later FR?90 million, comparable to US$12.7 billion as of 2009 with consideration to inflation) to be paid by the Republic of Haiti in claims over property lost through the Haitian Revolution in return for diplomatic recognition. The demand was allegedly delivered to the country by 12 French warships armed with 500 cannons."

"Diplomatic recognition by France of Haiti only came in 1834, a full thirty years after the latter country's declaration of independence. The indemnity was not fully paid until 1947"

An indemnity, not paid off by the Haitians until the year 1947. It seems that the Haitian economy, in part because of this punitive indemnity, NEVER recovered, with disastrous consequences for everyone.

[prior to the Haitian slave rebellion, the island was the SECOND richest territory in the western hemisphere, second only the British North America, the cultivation of sugar cane and coffee being the primary sources of revenue. After the slave rebellion, Haiti has never recovered the wealthy status it once had. In part, due to the damaging reparations agreed to?]

Indemnity, of course, not merely confined to the conflict between France and Haiti. Also an indemnity of grossly punitive measures taken by the victor of the Franco-Prussian War, 1870, against the vanquished. Prussia [Germany] demanding as part of a peace treaty reparations, harsh, brutal and unremitting, designed to impoverish the French!

"After the Franco-Prussian War, according to conditions of Treaty of Frankfurt (May 10, 1871), France was obliged to pay a war indemnity of 5 billion gold francs in 5 years. German troops remained in parts of France until the last installment of the indemnity was paid in September 1873, before the obliged date."

[note the emphasis on payment in GOLD FRANCS!! NO "funny money" or inflated currency wanted!! ONLY the real stuff - - GILT!!]

"the last instalment of the indemnity was paid off in September 1873, before the obliged date. It was the most successful case of war reparations in history."

At the time, the intention was for German troops to occupy French territory until the indemnity was paid off. The thought was too that the French would need YEARS or DECADES to pay the indemnity off. Also, an indemnity that would cripple and hobble the French as a world power, reparations intended to weaken and sap the strength of the overall French economy for a period of three to five DECADES!!

It must be said that the French people responded to the indemnity with great resolve. Paying the indemnity off in three years, far quicker and earlier and easier than anticipated, the indignity and insult to the French public creating a patriotic fervor that could not be denied.

These indemnities have consequences that can cause problems for continual decades and even centuries!!

This all gets very confusing? Sometimes the winner pays [Haiti vs. France], sometimes the loser pays [France vs. Prussia]? What is that?

coolbert.