Here's an assignment for list members who haven't tuned out yet: come up with
three well-identified French-language anti-American websites that specialize in
attacking everything American. Then look for three well-identified
English-language anti-French websites that specialize in attacking everything
French. Explain the difference.
Panama was an occasion for a huge scandal that rocked the French republic. A
little like Halliburton & Co today - or rather tomorrow. BTW, who built the
Suez Canal? And who builds and runs bullet trains all over Europe and through
the Chunnel? Amtrak? Ya win some, ya lose some. Get real, and don't forget that
mirror for reference.
Before the doughboys arrived, WWI was a bloody stalemate. There is no doubt
that Wilson wanted to achieve Great Power status through intervention. The same
Wilson who rigidly segregated the entire federal government. French officers
had to be taught about the virulent racism of their American peers to avoid
misundertandings. But as the Yanks were kind enough to mention, they had a debt
of gratitude called Lafayette. You'll find a symbol of French gratitude in
every US state. It's called a 'Merci boxcar.' Look for one near you. On the
downside, though, was the first wave of Spanish flu, shipped straight from US
barracks. Kind of a mixed blessing, if you ask me.
WWII as a land war was pretty much won by the Russians with major Allied help,
not the other way round. The Allies did the fighting at sea and in the air.
Total US casualties worldwide (combatants, noncombatants, deported) were lower
than French casualties in absolute terms and far smaller in relative terms -
without counting French colonies. Nowhere close to the rates and figures in
Germany or Eastern Europe. Stalin kept clamoring for a second front to relieve
his war effort - but Churchill and Roosevelt would have been insane to allow
the Russians to overrun Western Europe, having been on the offensive ever since
they stopped the Germans at Kurk in the spring of 1943. While you're at it,
remember that June 6 was an _Allied_ invasion. Only in Hollywood do they think
the US was alone facing Nazi Germany. The Brits had been at war all along, and
I don't see any 'English jokes' about Dunkirk or the occupied Channel Islands
or their various surrenders to Japanese forces. Could t
he US have invaded Europe and beaten Germany single-handedly had it not
already been at war with Russia? I don't think so.
Vietnam was a triumph of French and American blindness and arrogance - guess
where the resources to fight the Viet-Minh were coming from? SE Asia lost
millions, not thousands, in that wretched regional conflict. There is nothing
for the French or the Americans to feel happy about. My late great-uncle and my
great-aunt and godmother were evacuated only days before Saigon fell. Cousins
of mine came within a whisker of being drafted and tossed into the meat grinder.
The US exists by dint of French intervention followed a giant French land sale,
and France remains an independent country thanks to the US. Not a bad deal, but
as I said there is now a reality-deprived class of people in this country who
think they are building the next empire and that we're in the way. What's
really in the way is the genes of this country, and those genes are mixed with
ours in a fundamental way. Those people are still trying, but they are getting
desperate. We'll see how it plays out. - Phil
On 19:03, Walt Wayman wrote:
>And who finished the Panama Canal after the French gave up? Who came
>to their defense in WW-1 and WW-2 and took the whole country back
>from the Germans? Who took over the Viet Nam mess when they cut and
>ran, although we didn't do much better, losing over 40,000 lives
>there. One was almost me.
>
>I think they're fair game.
>
>Walt
==
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