This was labelled Operation Marie. The Royal Navy was to ferry the Free French troops to East Africa. The French plan was enthusiastically approved by Churchill, but it was not implemented until the naval assets became available in February 1941. Nonetheless, in November a certain Major Hamilton went to Aden to begin preparing a "Mobile Force" for blowing up the railway from Djibouti to Dire Dawa. In the end, this plan was dropped, since it was not considered politic to upset the Vichyites at that moment. On 24 March 1941, in an attempt to prevent an Italian withdrawal from occupied British Somaliland, the British bombed a section of the Djibouti–Addis Ababa railway and met with heavy French anti-aircraft fire. By that time, the British offensive against the Italians had tightened the blockade of French Somaliland and a famine was setting in. Malnutrition-related diseases took many lives, 70% of them women and children. The locals named the blockade the "carmii", a word for a type of sorghum usually reserved for cattle, but used as human food at the height of the famine. In March 1941, with Free French forces facing the Vichyite garrison in Somaliland, the British changed their policy to "rally French Somaliland to the Allied cause without bloodshed". The Free French were to arrange a voluntary "rallying" ("ralliement") by means of propaganda while the British were to blockade the colony. Wavell considered that if British pressure was applied, a rally would appear to have been coerced. Wavell preferred to let the propaganda continue and provide a small amount of supplies under strict control. As part of this propaganda war, there were even competing newspapers: the Free French published "Djibouti Libre" ("Free Djibouti") and smuggled it into the colony, while the Vichy authorities published the official "Djibouti Français" ("French Djibouti"). In April, after the fall of Addis Ababa, the British tried to negotiate with Nouailhetas for transporting Italian prisoners-of-war along the Djibouti–Addis Ababa railway and evacuating them through Djibouti's port. On 1 May Nouailhetas telegraphed Aden to inform the British that he had received permission from Vichy to negotiate. On 8 May General Alan Cunningham responded with his proposals, but no commitments. When the policy of stoking a "rally" had no immediate effect, Wavell suggested negotiations with Nouailhetas to obtain use of the port and railway.