Have you ever thought of a solution to a problem that you thought was bulletproof but it ended up making things worse? Well, we’ve all been there and so were the French colonial officials in 1900s Hanoi in their futile quest to kill plague-ridden rats.
At the turn of the century, after annexing Vietnam, the French focused on shaping their colony in their own image in a dramatic fashion. The ancient capital of Thăng Long-Hanoi was no exception to this endeavour, which was transformed into a classic French colonial city, equipped with wide boulevards, villas, a big opera house (because you’ve got to have one of those) and sewers. The French were religiously proud of the sewers because nothing says ‘the white man’s burden’ like showing the ‘natives’ how they ‘got their shits together.’ However, such technological advancement allowed a very medieval problem to thrive, sewer rats… filthy sewer rats that carried the bubonic plague.
Eventually, rats became rampant on the streets of colonial Hanoi, scaring white people at every opportunity. To solve this rodent problem, at first, the French formed (suicidal) squads of Vietnamese hunters who would dive into the sewers to kill the rats. While a large number of rats were killed, it’s important to remember rats breed like…rats. Thus, it was decided that cash prizes would be offered to engage the local population in massacring rats and they only needed to hand in the tails to collect the rewards.
Imagine being in the meeting where they came up with this because… ‘c’est la vie.’ At first glance, it seemed like it was working until rats began to re-emerge but… without their tails intact. As it turns out, the ordinary Vietnamese did not bother to kill the whole rat but only cut its tail and freed them. In some cases, they raised them on farms! So much for ‘creative solutions’. Interestingly, a similar case also occurred in British India but with cobras, hence the ‘Cobra Effect’, when a solution to a problem causes unintended consequences.
Overall, the moral of the story is if you’re offered money to kill something, remember to make a farm full of it.
