From: mf0w+@andrew.cmu.edu (Michel Fougeres)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.guns,soc.culture.french
Subject: Re: (was): Guns, and the necessity to trust (French bashing)
Date: 30 Aug 92 02:06:19 GMT
Article-I.D.: andrew.cec2oPy00WBNM4K3EX
Organization: Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA

Excerpts From Captions of netnews.soc.culture.french:
29-Aug-92  Re: (was): Guns, and the ne..  Claude Manoit@isle.Eng.S (11248)  
>From: claude@isle.Eng.Sun.COM (Claude Manoit)
>Subject: Re: (was): Guns, and the necessity to trust (French bashing)
>Date: 29 Aug 1992 07:23:43 GMT
> 
> 
>Larry, Jerry, James, and others ...


>To the best of my knowledge France is the only major country which has
>never been at war with the US (forget about the Suez canal incident).

>I don't know of any "imperialistic adventures" which didn't require
>the draft in France (but I know some in the US ...) in the 20th
>century at least.

Sorry, both of the above assertions are mistaken.

There WAS a war between the US and France, even though it was small and
did not last long.  It took place during the French Revolution or under
Napole'on.  I think it was mostly naval, but it still was a war.  At
that time I think France still owned the Louisiane (which must have been
quite bigger than to-day's American State of Louisiana.)  If you want
more exact details you have to hit the proper history books.   Some
historians have called it "the forgotten franco-american war" (with
reason). 


And the "imperialistic adventure" which Claude Manoit does not know
about is simply the failed French war of reconquest in Indochina, which
started in 1946.  That war was pursued strictly with mercenaries.   The
French mercenaries in the "Arm'ee Coloniale" had to sign a paper stating
that they volunteered to serve in Indochina before the army could send
them there.   The mercenaries in the "Le'gion E'trange`re" -- where
during several years more than 50% of the enlistees were natives of
Germany-Austria -- most probably had no choice but going wherever the
French army sent them.  (That quite a number of them deserted later is
another story.)   On the spot, the French enlisted also a big number of
Cambodian mercenaries, especially since the Cambodians, for their own
good reasons, hated the Vietnamese and could be counted upon to be
ruthless (with the Vietnamese.)  The French recruited even many
Vietnamese mercenaries but treated them with a measure of amused
contempt since most of them were docile and scared nobodies who would
rarely risk their life in a fight and were hopelessly despised by the
civilian Vietnamese population at large.   Starting in 1948, the French
Army's big brass, which by then was starting to be seriously afraid of
the outcome of that war, began to enroll and bring to the fight in
Indochina huge numbers of North-African mercenaries (mostly Moroccans to
my knowledge) who were (in)famous for their ferocity.   (But that
ferocity had not enabled them to win bigger wars for France either in
1914-1918 or in 1940.)   I think the Korean mercenaries came only later,
probably under the Americans.  Before the French debacle in 1954,
Ge'ne'ral Delattre de Tassigny had flown to the US (at least once) to
beg the Americans to send armaments and money to help the French (I am
not clear whether Delattre openly asked the Americans to send troops of
their own but I know that many Americans in the military were itching to
join the fray at that time -- to save the French from disaster.)   The
disaster struck anyway.

                                
>WW2: France lost more than 2 million people while I believe the ratio
>of population with the US was -as of now- 1/5, which means that France
>lost proportionally 20 times more people. And a significant proportion
>of those people were fighters (both military and resistants).

This number of 2 millions is absurdly high, it is pure wishful thinking
!  (But you should count about half a million Jews rounded up by the
VERY FRENCH OOOOHHH SO VERY FRENCH PATRIOTIC POLICE and GENDARMES and
sold to the Germans for a few francs -- after which the Germans of
course sent them (sent those Jews) to death camps.)

                                    Michel

=====================================================================
If the facts are against you, argue the law.
It the law is against you, argue the facts.
If the facts and the law are against you, yell like hell.

                                (MURPHY) 
Newsgroups: talk.politics.guns