I Became a Plutocrat in World War I: Starting with Saving France-Chapter 972: Releasing the Recording

The meeting room fell silent instantly, with everyone turning their eyes to the secretary, including General Winter and the British representative.

Clemenceau could hardly believe it either; he looked at the secretary half-skeptically: "Are you telling the truth? But now, it has been only about four hours since Shire captured the Liege Fortress!"

The Liege Fortress is about 190 kilometers away from the Ruhr Industrial District, which is just the marching time for mechanized troops over four hours.

In other words, Shire’s troops had just arrived at the Ruhr and already occupied it, which was hard to believe.

At that moment, the phone rang; Clemenceau picked up the call, identified himself, then soon opened his mouth wide in shock, turned to the representatives of various countries, his voice trembling with excitement:

"It’s a call from General Gallieni."

"The news is true, Shire’s troops have occupied the Ruhr."

"We have won, gentlemen, we have successfully occupied the Ruhr!"

In the final sentence, Clemenceau forgot to maintain his composure, madly clenching his fists and waving them at the representatives while letting out a beast-like roar.

The representatives burst into loud cheers, shaking hands and hugging each other in celebration.

The Belgian representative shed tears of excitement.

Recapturing the Liege Fortress wasn’t the best outcome for them; as long as Germany existed and remained strong, Belgium would always be under the German threat.

But if the French Army had taken the Ruhr, it would mean that Belgium no longer needed to worry about the threat of the German Army on the border.

The Dutch representative also secretly breathed a sigh of relief, with a look of joy and gratitude on his face.

They had been worried all along that Germany would attack Holland at the last moment and plunder wealth and resources for the battlefield supplies.

Fortunately, Shire’s attack was swift, so swift that no one had time to react, including the Germans.

General Winter sat back in his chair weakly, as this was not good news for England.

At this time, Clemenceau unexpectedly mentioned General Winter by name, with a teasing tone: "Our British representatives and generals don’t seem too happy; do you think the fight isn’t over?"

The representatives collectively burst into laughter.

The Greek representative, emboldened by the presence of the "League of Nations Army," added: "Or maybe they are relieved that Shire achieved victory so quickly. Now, they only need to wait to share the spoils of victory!"

The laughter in the conference room grew louder.

General Winter stood up awkwardly and, ignoring everyone else, seemed to only acknowledge France.

"No, Prime Minister." General Winter struggled to maintain a smile, but his words of praise felt insincere:

"I certainly am happy for Shire’s victory."

"This is a miracle; he actually managed to seize the Germans’ industrial base in such a short time."

"I just can’t believe this is real..."

Clemenceau interrupted General Winter’s performance.

"Is that so?" he retorted, "But I feel like Britain doesn’t want France, or perhaps I should say the ’International Alliance,’ to win."

General Winter’s expression changed: "I don’t understand what you’re saying, Prime Minister." 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

Clemenceau motioned for the representatives to quiet down, swept his sharp gaze across the room, and finally fixed it on General Winter, speaking with sarcasm: "Don’t be in a rush, General, let’s listen to a recording."

He nodded to the side, and an assistant quickly brought out a gramophone and began playing it.

The sound wasn’t clear, even severely distorted because of the dual barriers of recording equipment and telephone, but as soon as the ambassadors and representatives heard it, they knew it was a conversation between the US Secretary of War and the British Expeditionary Force Commander Haig:

"Good news, General. We have reached a consensus; they will launch a counterattack in five days."

"Great, Minister. Now, it’s time to inform Pershing of the plan."

The two very brief sentences made General Winter’s face change dramatically; he knew what it was, but other representatives were left in a fog, not understanding what it meant.

Clemenceau lifted the needle and, standing tall, faced the representatives:

"Gentlemen, let me explain."

"This is a conversation between Secretary of War Baker and General Haig. There is nothing strange about this."

"The strange thing is that this recording was made five days before the German Army launched a counterattack on the British and American troops."

"Let’s listen to it once more..."

With that, Clemenceau played the recording again.

This time, all the representatives understood.

"My God, Baker and Haig knew the timing of the Germans’ counterattack."

"Not only did they know, but they said, ’We have reached a consensus,’ meaning they reached a consensus with the Germans?"

"So, the British and American troops’ retreat in the direction of Hindenburg was intentional; their purpose was to let the German Army encircle the First Armored Army stationed in Saarbrücken!"

...

General Winter hurried to refute: "No, this is slander; this recording proves nothing, it might just be another military operation..."

But before he could finish, the angry representatives cut him off:

"Shut up, you traitors."

"You colluded with the enemy to deal with your allies, this is a disgraceful betrayal."

"You should be hanged, along with Baker and Haig, they are all spies!"

...

England had long been hated, only each country, under its hegemony, dared not speak out of resentment.

Now that such a thing had happened and with powerful France backing them, they took this opportunity to vent their dissatisfaction.

The number of people involved grew, and the criticism became more intense, soon escalating to spitting and throwing paper balls, and some representatives even found a few eggs from somewhere to pelt at the British representative.

General Winter got hit, with his head soaked in yellow and white egg liquid, humiliated and angry, yet there was nothing he could do.

Eventually, amid the jeering, the British representative slunk out of the meeting hall.

Not only did they leave the meeting hall, but they also hurriedly packed up and took the first train to Dunkirk.

(Note: At this time, aside from Shire’s transport planes, there were no aircraft capable of carrying so many people.)

They fled quickly, so fast that the French military and civilians had yet to react.

But Baker and Haig were not so lucky.

At that moment, Baker and Haig were in the office of the Joint Command of Freeman discussing Shire’s capture of the Ruhr.

"Unbelievable, the Germans are so vulnerable," Baker said, "Even the Liege Fortress was breached by Shire, and it only took a few hours."

Haig said nothing.

As a general, he knew it wasn’t that the Germans were "vulnerable," but that Shire’s equipment and tactics were terrifying.

He had developed bombers capable of penetrating 3-meter concrete fortresses!

From then on, was there anything Shire couldn’t destroy?

Even London wouldn’t be safe!

Just as he was thinking this, there was a commotion outside the door, with a dense crowd surrounding the command, including both military personnel and civilians.

Amidst the confusion, a guard dashed in, reporting to Haig in panic: "General, you must leave here immediately, they are targeting you."

Then he added: "And you too, Minister!"