 Jules Ferry's cabinet approved this recommendation, and Courbet was replaced in command of the expeditionary corps on 16December 1883 by General Charles-Théodore Millot—ironically, on the very day on which he captured Sơn Tây.He resumed command of the Tonkin Coasts naval division, and for the next six months played a most unwelcome subordinate role, hunting down bands of Vietnamese pirates in the Gulf of Tonkin while Millot was winning glory in the Bắc Ninh campaign.Courbet's luck changed in June 1884.