Analysis of information sources in references of the Wikipedia article "Gustave Rolin-Jaequemyns" in English language version.
On 13 July 1893, just one day short of the annual French commemoration of Bastille Day, the commander of a small flotilla of French warships ignored Siam's urgent entreaties and his own government's prior promises-to force the passage of the Menam Chao Phraya at its mouth, off Paknam, and proceeded up the river, under fire, to Bangkok. Thus began what was without question one of the most critical and dangerous decades in Siam's more-than-seven-hundred-year-long struggle to maintain her national integrity.
Into this Southeast Asia contest between the Vietnamese imperium and the Siamese mandala for control over Cambodia and the weakened Lao muang came France, a modern European state with altogether different notions of territorial possession and sovereignty.
