Then, on January 30th, M. Clemenceau granted diplomatic powers to M. Henry Bérenger. He immediately sent commissions of inquiry into every country in which France might have petroleum interests, to London, Warsaw, Bukarest, Constantinople, Baku, and Mesopotamia. M. Bérenger was all in favour of a great scheme for founding an inter-allied company in which the French State, bringing as its share the German concessions which would be ceded to her by the treaty of peace, should enter into association with Great Britain and the _Royal Dutch_. On March 7th, the Walter Long-Bérenger agreement was signed, fixing the broad outlines of a common oil policy in Mesopotamia, Rumania, and eventually in Galicia and Russia. It was a preliminary sketch of the San Remo Agreement. It remained only to prepare for its realization. Eighteen days later, without losing any time, the _Royal Dutch_ offered to co-operate in the plans of the French Government in matters concerning the management and exploitation of the various oil interests which might be reserved to France as a consequence of the treaty of peace. It proposed, moreover, to place at France's disposal "all its world-wide technical, industrial, commercial and financial organization, not only in the countries mentioned, but also _in all other countries_" in which she might need its co-operation. And it offered to supply France by priority, in time of peace as in time of war. M. Clemenceau welcomed the proposal. In order not to offend Parliament and public opinion, which was tending more and more in favour of a national oil policy, the _Royal Dutch_ entered into partnership with one of the great commercial banks, the _Union Parisienne_, in order to create with its concurrence companies of which the nationality, if not the capital, should be French.