In spite of its promises, the _Royal Dutch_ did not succeed in delivering sufficient quantities of oil. By March 13, 1920, the reserves had fallen below the danger-line, to less than 75,000 tons. The Director-General, anxious about supplies, decided to resort to the Americans. And as the powers of the Petrol Commission had been legally extinct since April 26th, and its provisional monopoly at an end since April 21st, he established the system of authorizing imports, and granted licences to several companies which had made contracts with the _Standard Oil_. Would the _Standard Oil_ succeed in re-entering France? It was not given the time, for the San Remo Agreement had just been signed (April 24, 1920). A few days later, the French Government resumed control of oil, and M. Laurent Eynac, the new Commissioner, taking the view that what had happened during the interregnum had no legal existence, hastened to annul the licences to import granted to the _Standard_. The great American trust found once more in France, as it had so often found since the War in other parts of the world, the "closed door." II. Diplomatic Negotiations "The diplomatic history of the Franco-British negotiations concerning Mosul will, when it is made known, constitute the most eloquent document upon British policy towards France."[48] According to the agreements of 1916, Mosul was in the French zone of influence in Arabia. Great Britain began by obtaining the cession of our territorial rights, as recognized by this treaty. The French Government gave way to her desires in spite of the opposition of its Foreign Minister. But when, later on, we demanded in compensation that 50 per cent. of the oil of Mosul should be reserved for us, Great Britain produced at the propitious moment the difficulty, unsuspected by our negotiators, of the _Turkish Petroleum_, a company which she had opportunely created in collaboration with the _Royal Dutch_ a few months before the declaration of War in 1914. Now the _Turkish Petroleum_ had obtained from the Turkish Government the grant of all the naphtha of the vilayets that we lost in renouncing the Sykes-Picot Agreement of 1916. So, having abandoned Mosul, all we were to receive in exchange was the oil with which Britain consented, as a special favour, to supply us. "When one knows England well," wrote M. Le Page, with justice, "one is not surprised that, when, with the help of France she has driven out America from the territory she covets, she should strive to throw over her helper, having got rid of her rival."