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So what to make of this? Jacques Chirac has suddenly come out with a statement (French version here) that not only is France prepared to use nuclear weapons “against any state which launched a terrorist attack against it”, their nuclear forces had been “configured for such an event”.
As clearly this is a direct threat to nuke Iran, I can only wonder what the hell is going on here? Makes me wonder what exactly do they know in the Quai d’Orsay that they are not sharing with the rest of us.
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Well it’s certainly better than Chirac grovelling on about negotiation all the time. It shows that they are prepared to engage in some form of deterrence.
I’ll just take it as a bit of populism. Things might otherwise be bad but damn it if we’ll ever lose our croissants and nukes.
Don’t get me wrong… France is a decent place, Socialism aside, but rallying national pride with mentions of nuclear weapons doesn’t strike me as a good policy.
Hey, now that the FRENCH are cool with it, Hollywood’s gonna go all pro-nuke.
ANSWER will march for it.
The American left will start producing position papers justifying th euse of nukes as necessary for the protection of progressive values.
Just watch.
I’m not very surprised. People tend to get the French wrong — they’re not soft on terrorism, they’re just very cynically self-interested. They take their own security very seriously, just not anyone else’s.
Matt McIntosh – D’accord.
I think this is not posturing. Chirac means it. He may be daft when he talks of les deux rives de la Mediterranée, but when it comes to the security of France, not daft. He won’t blink.
Why do I get the idea that Paris may wind up nuking the suburbs of its own cities/
And lest anyone cite the Charles de Gaul as an example of Frances inability to deliver such an attack, just remember, DHL is an EU corporation, and delivers everywhere.
Faster than the deGaul, too.
Are you saying that we might finally see a French military victory? Hmm.
He’s saying “Don’t try it on us (but that Blair is a useless twit, so you could always have a go at les Rosbifs).”
The Sanity Inspector – Why do I get the idea that Paris may wind up nuking the suburbs of its own cities/
Because you’re incredibly uninformed and lack a sense of humour?
Why so grumpy? I thought that was rather humourous actually, given the fact so many French ‘burbs are mostly inhabited bu car-burning Muslims.
Thanks for pointing that out, Old Jack Tar, as most of us have been in a coma since just before Christmas.
I find indefensible the notion that the French, who have one of the two military forces in “Europe” – which includes Great Britain in this instance – of scrambling within X minutes …. oh why continue the thought as it is so well known?
Oh, French physicists are so stupid that they developed nuclear weapons without realising that if they used them in the suburbs of French cities, it would destroy the French people! How amusing! And where are you registered on the list of international nuclear physicists, Old Jack Tar?
Your comments are usually apt, but this was absolutely offensive.
Chirac is such a liar, this pronunciamento will make the Islamofascists doubt he has any nukes at all. Even if the French have them, it is doubtful they could get off the ground or reach their targets. Have they managed to get the Charles de Gaulle out of port without rendering the crew sterile?
@Verity: Being offensive is feature, not a bug, as far as the French are concerned. “It is good to hate the French” (Al Bundy, “Married – with Children”).
Mitch, I have absolutely no idea of who Al Bundy is or what what “Married – with Children” is, but do not try to tell me what is “a feature, not a bug, as far as the French are concerned” because that makes you sound so terribly ignorant.
Who the hell Al Bundy is and why he is being quoted, who knows? I lived in France and do not think being offensive to these kindly, pleasant and helpful people is acceptable, unless you have a focus, then … bombs away! I’m all for it!
God, ignorant smartass people make me sick! How long did you live in France, Mitch? How much French do you speak, Mitch? Have you ever been to France, Mitch? Could we get your opinion on the Ni Putes Ni Soumises” movement in France, Mitch? Does Jacques Chirac speak any English at all, Mitch? Do please let us have the benefit of your considered and highly informed opinion. Mitch.
Verity, a humour bypass is a reversible operation. Lighten up, eh?
“How long did you live in France, Mitch?”
I’m happy to join Mitch as an ignorant smartass who doesn’t speak French. I have been there once for a few hours, at their crappy De Gaulle airport. I made sure I didn’t spend a cent in their country. I only stopped there because it was a business trip and I had no other options. They lost my luggage. Maybe they could read my mind.
If the French go after the car-burning Muslims in the suburbs, Verity is right. They are smart enough not to use their nuclear weapons. They will crop-dust them with non-persistent nerve gas from helicopters. So, there, that was simple enough. Will it come to that? Too early to say.
“[T]hese kindly, pleasant and helpful people” may be lovely one at a time, much like every Pakistani cab driver I have ever met coming home on many late nights in Chicago for many, many years. But these kinds of one-on-one personal experiences are absolutely meaningless politically. “These kindly, pleasant and helpful people” happen to live in France, a country which is hostile to the United States, which befriends our enemies, which works to make the world a more dangerous place for us.
So, I happily join with my fellow ChicagoBoy Mitch and all the rest of the knuckle-dragging right-wingers in America who can’t speak French and have never been there. I hate France. The only difference on my part is I don’t think the French are funny. Nor do I think they are surrender monkeys. They are hostile, and I don’t find that funny, and when they want to they know how to fight. For example, even in the 21st century they sometimes go to Africa and massacre black people with automatic weapons, like back in the 19th C. So, the French aren’t funny.
Moreover, one opinion poll after another shows that “these kindly, pleasant and helpful people” detest the United States and wish us ill. They are free to think that and act accordingly. They are also free to suffer whatever consequences may flow from it as Americans wake up to these facts. They are not our friends. There is no reason for us to pretend they are. There is no reason to treat them as if they are. “These kindly, pleasant and helpful people” elect their government and will bear the consequence of their government’s actions, including provoking the deep and long-lasting hostility of vast numbers of people in the United States.
All that said, Chirac isn’t joking. The French are happy to appease terrorists if that means the terrorists will murder Americans instead of French people. But if his country is actually threatened, I have no doubt he would use whatever weapons they have to deter or retaliate or even preempt. To that extent, I respect what Chirac is doing.
What Lexington Green said.
Chirac is fortunate that New Zealand didn’t have nuclear weapons and the same attitude, when the French state launched a terrorist attack on its territory (Rainbow Warrior).
New Zealand was a tree-hugging Communist proxy of the Greenpeace movement. The French military should sink the Rainbow Warrior again.
As for the Charles de Gaulle, today it is due to go through the Suez Canal en route to the Indian Ocean.
Meanwhile the Royal Navy will have no aircraft on its aircraft carriers by the end of 2006 -the Harrier is being withdrawn- and in five years two new aircraft carriers with no aircraft (the new ones have been cancelled by the US). Assuming no delays in building the carriers. The new RN frigate is designed to defend itself and has no capacity to provide cover – which seems a little pointless. The new Trident is no more than willy-waving: more cruise missile carrying subs would make more sense, but guess what the RN will get…
Billll said
the Charles de Gaul
the deGaul
Considering the man’s actions in fighting the Nazis in the summer of 1940 is it too much to ask that you learn to spell his name correctly?
Gustave La Joie said
The new RN frigate is designed to defend itself and has no capacity to provide cover
RN frigates are designed for anti-ship and anti-submarine work, cover against air attack will be provided by the Type 45 destroyer. Your points on the aircraft carriers are valid, a typical government debacle that will put lives at risk.
“.. but rallying national pride with mentions of nuclear weapons…”
That’s what Chirac is doing. Also trying to rally public opinion to support the defense expenditures. Internal politics.
It’s all posturing, no substance.
I doubt France’s ability and determination to do anything except talk.
Still, I’m not opposed to Chirac’s pronouncement. I only don’t expect it to have consequences.
Is it just me or has anybody else notcied that verity seems to have lost the plot. The majority of recent comments threads seem to be polluted by his/her/its insane rants.
De Gaulle’s actions in fighting the Nazis, with the exception of a few skirmishes during the Battle of France, consisted of running away and spending the rest of the war getting in the way of the people who were doing the heavy lifting.
Plus ca change…
Nukes don’t count, as in my mind if you are ever forced to use nukes you have already lost. So no luck here for the French on that front.
A strong, principled stance on terror backed up by actual action is much more effective I’d say. Chances of France ever having such a policy?
0%!
Whaddya mean ya don’t know who I am,eh?
I’ll get Peggy on ya.
Considering the man’s actions in fighting the Nazis in the summer of 1940 is it too much to ask that you learn to spell his name correctly?
Mm. From wikipedia:
On May 17, 1940, De Gaulle attacked the German tank forces at Montcornet. With only 200 French tanks and no air support, the offensive had little impact on the German advance. There was more success on May 28, when De Gaulle’s tanks forced the German infantry to retreat at Caumont. This was one of the few significant tactical successes the French gained against the Germans during the campaign. Prime Minister Paul Reynaud promoted him provisional brigadier general (thus his title of général De Gaulle).
He seems to have grasped the usefulness of armor, and managed to use them properly once. This appears to be all it takes to qualify as the best French general in WW2.
With regards to his later actions, xj summarizes them fairly succinctly.
Why are the French so proud of this guy? Is it a case of having little else to be proud of?
[sorry if this is a double, it’s whining about the security code]
It will be interesting to see the outcry if one of those who perpetrates the crime that causes the nuke is a French citizen. That will cause the French left to collectively have an anurism.
Gustav La Joie is presumably French. He has every right not to like the NZ government at the time nor Greepeace – that’s his right.
However, neither NZ nor Greenpeace had threatened anyone and neither had they done anything outside the law, nor threatened to. The Rainbow Warrier never went into French territorial waters and so it was fully entitled to do what it intended to do.
The French secret service, however, committed a terrorist act on NZ sovereign territory, without provocation. The French state denied involvement and even condemned it as a terrorist act! It eventually co-operated in imprisoning the agents involved (but releasing them as soon as it got the opportunity). France was later forced to admit guilt. It was eventually revealed that Mitterand personally authorised the attack.
So the French government has admitted that it carried out terrrorist acts on the territory of an historical ally.
Hardly, Andrew.
They will immediately invoke conspiracy theory to prove that it’s a CIA/Mossad/MI5 frameup creating a pretext for military action. Thierry Meyssan will write another book, Michael Moore will make another move that is given a standing ovation at Cannes, and life will go on…. minus a substantial chunk of the middle east.
Lexington, I agree with a lot of what you wrote. The average French person has been brainwashed about the United States. When I defended America, people simply stared at me in astonishment. How could any sane person defend America? (Strange though, how they bravely manage to overcome their inhibitions when they are queuing up to apply for Green Cards.)
What irritated me, above, is the reflexive, uninformed drooling out of the side of the mouth that occurs every time France is mentioned. There is plenty about France to dislike, but let’s not make idiocies up. Thinking its funny to say France would nuke its own suburbs is so stupid, so infantile that it is profoundly irritating. France bashing is an ancient English sport and we are extremely good at it, but that is because we base our insults on actual knowledge not on some quip some Hollywood writer wrote for Dave Letterman to say.
I don’t think the familiarity with the French that comes from living in a French village can be compared to the familiarity with Pakistanis that comes from riding in the back of a cab. By and large, the French are kindly and helpful, even if they do bump you into the frozen food lockers with their trollies in the supermarkets, and knock you off the sidewalk because a group of them are walking four abreast looking at each other, not ahead.
Engendering an intense dislike of the United States is all part of the European project. It’s worked pretty well, except in Britain, where we are part of the Anglosphere, Lexington, with a shared language and shared values and a shared sense of humour. Chirac personally likes the US and speaks fluent and elegant English, although he’d never let on. I don’t know what they hope to derive from this anti-Americanism, but it is vicious and ugly. It the leaders who have promoted this attitude – through the French version of the BBC, which is even worse than the Beeb for promoting the government line, and the lefty newspapers. Unaccountably, the people believe what their government tells them. So much for French logic and cynicism.
Why not unite against the common enemy of advanced Western societies, militant Islam? Why America? It’s lunacy.
For what it is worth, I believe that Chirac was not posturing. I believe he fully intends to order a nuclear strike if the government perceives any danger to France. I also think the Iranians are smart enough to understand this.
I can’t be bothered to reply to the adolescent insults attacking me personally.
If you have not had the opportunity, I strongly recommend those interested in French history to read Alastair Horne’s marvellous trilogy focussuing on three crucial events in modern French history, namely the siege of Paris during the Franco Prussian War, the battle of Verdun in World War 1, and the the fall of France in 1940. I am still trying to finish his history of the Algerian war of independence.
Verity: I do hope your haidresser is visiting during this particularly trying time. Apropos the adolescent personal attacks, I have the impression that your various posts suggest that this is your forte. As for the French, I don’t think they care much for the Anglosphere & vice versa.
Your not knowing who Al Bundy is comes as a great shock to me.
Married with Children, ahem apropos of nothing, you understand! was the perfect antidote for the Cosby show, showing at roughly the same time(era).
It was about a loser shoe salesman, his workshy tart of a wife and their moron children. It was very funny.
These folk were what America calls trailer trash, cept they had a house of sorts and bad things happened to them all the time as opposed to the Cosby’s when.. gosh… although, spit, persons of colour, the great American dream always saw them through.If anyone wants to jump on the “spit” comment then feel free , but my explanation may not be the conclusion you have jumped to.
It in turn begat Roseanne and was probably the original template for the Simpsons.
Regards your comedy correspondent .
Chirac is a bone head, the only way a nuclear threat / bluff like his works is IF you both suffer a MASSIVE attack and you can identify a state actor to retaliate against. Or you are a known lunatic.
So if israel is saying, “We’ll nuke one or all of Medina, Mecca, Damascus or tehran – your choice – if we lose Tel Aviv” You know they mean it – losing Tel Aviv basically destroys Israel so they have nothing left to lose.
But if France says well nuke er, somebody!, if a bomb offs 500 or 5000 frenchmen in Paris it’s a pointless threat. It’s not like it’s likely anybody will know who did it – so are you going to nuke “les banlieues”? Nuke, say, Tehran and kill millions of people most of whom are ignorant of their government’s idiot plans? Detonate a nuke in the desert outside Damascus to confirm your displeasure? Right. Helpful, that
Nukes are, for all their power, remarkably useless weapons. You can’t just go around killing millions of non-participant civilians and retain “civilized” because their gov did something of true idiocy, if you do, it just inflames the bombed and survivors and observers poor opinion of you.
(Unwanted Headline: France Nukes Shiraz and causes 2million dead in retaliation for anonymous attack in Lyon that killed 2000. )
They are loser’s weapon : If we lose, you lose too.
As a terrorist weapon they are very effecive, but pretty hard to deliver correctly – and they tend to bring ultra serious consequences on the state actor who built them.
If only because the US will get it’s knickers in a very tight twist if any major city is nuked by some looney. Here’s a free hint: Twisting the US’s knickers that tight lowers your life expectancy drammatically.
RAB – not that I care, but Americans don’t call these people “trailer trash”. That is how the British have, wrongly, picked it up. The phrase is “trailer park trash”. That’s the only way it makes sense.
Mearly trying to be informative Verity, to everyone, not just to you!
Is mr Teasy weasy on his way? I’m with Expat on this one.
“. . . which is hostile to the United States, which befriends our enemies, which works to make the world a more dangerous place for us.”
Ah! San Francisco!
“Is it just me or has anybody else notcied that verity seems to have lost the plot.”
Yes. It’s just you.
“The American left will start producing position papers justifying the use of nukes as necessary for the protection of progressive values.”
If the left gets enough power in any country, this is exactly what they’ll do. There were a lot of speeches during the Cold War by Soviet, Red Chinese, Cuban, hell – all the communists – saying just that.
“It the leaders who have promoted this attitude – through the French version of the BBC, which is even worse than the Beeb for promoting the government line, and the lefty newspapers.”
Just so. Lefty leaders, lefty media.
Spare a little sympathy for the French. They’ve been assimilated by the lefty Borg.
F
Verity’s comment about reflexive, uniformed drooling is spot on, I find it most distasteful when it comes to the implied cowardice or incompetence of the French military. It is as a reposte that I raise the idea De Gaulle should receive acknowledgement for his defiance in the face of overwhelming odds, regardless of his later behaviour.
Are you saying that we might finally see a French military victory? Hmm.
Yawn, yawn, yawn, try Austerlitz or perhaps Yorktown. Better yet, read about the 6,000 French soldiers who laid down their lives in a rearguard action at Dunkirk ensuring the evacuation succeeded, I would happily class that as a victory.
Verity rightly notes the success of French nuclear scientists. I believe France helped Israel with its first nuclear research.
Well yes Noel, he should get plaudits for being the patriot he was and being a veteran of WW1, for defending his country staunchly.
Trouble is, not a single Frenchman knew who he was prior to to his fleeing to Britain and proposing his alternative govt to Vichy.
I have two French aunts who were sent, age 15 and 16, in 1940, to an aunt in Wales, who had married a “Taffy” from the first world war. Their father was a mayor of a little town outside Paris and knew what was going to happen .
Their father immediately set up a resistence group, an found 99% of the population indifferent to the idea of active resistence to the Nazis.
Hah! and those that were, were antagonistic to each other. Grassing each other up to the Gestapo, on the slightest provocation or idealistic daydream.
No wonder they live in Wales and dislike their fellow countrymen.
France hasn’t suceeded militarily in a war since the Revolution.
Trouble is, not a single Frenchman knew who he was prior to to his fleeing to Britain
Likewise Montgomery, Eisenhower, Patton, etc etc weren’t exactly household names until after the actions with which they are now associated, your point is what exactly?
an found 99% of the population indifferent to the idea of active resistence to the Nazis
Nothing like an anecdote as proof, what are you suggesting, the french resistance didn’t exist? That Free French forces didn’t fight in the Battle of Britain or Normandy?
France hasn’t suceeded militarily in a war since the Revolution
So their contribution to the allied victory in World War I was marginal then?
For what it is worth, the American historian Paxton is very good on the Vichy regime and how it was supported. To say that Vichy was not France’s finest hour is a statement of the obvious. Admiral Darlan was particularly anti-British prefering Germany to the Allied cause. It has only been in relatively recent times that the French have begun to examine the Vichy period in a candid way.
Noel Cooper: If you’re getting into comparisons, yes, it was marginal…..as was ours in comparison to the Russkis for example. We all fought in our weight class one way or the other………..The previous capitulation of France was, on the other hand, an eternal blot on the fleur-de-lis escutcheon. The patronising “non” from the pear-shaped seditioner (Quebec….unbelievable!) to British entry to the then Common Market (which it should have remained) was and is incredible. La gloire is everything.
yes, it was marginal
France suffered one third of all allied casualties, what is your definition of marginal?
Noel Cooper: Really? Sources please.
Gustave La Joie
New Zealand’s government in 1985 was certainly tree-hugging, but it was not communist. Economically speaking, that government proved to be more free-market than Thatcher’s. If anything, the fact that New Zealand was a first-world western country that fought to help the wretched French in two world wars should have far outweighed anything else in the government’s policy.
In any case, the French blew up a privately-owned vessel, murdering an innocent man in the process, so the policies of the government were irrelevant.
Fact is, the French picked on New Zealand only because it is so small and effectively defenceless. Typically cowardly. The French action was a disgrace, as are your comments.
Noel Cooper: Really? Sources please.
“To the million dead of the British Empire and the 1,700,000 French dead, we must add 1,500,000 soldiers of the Habsburg Empire who did not return, two million Germans, 460,000 Italians, 1,700,000 Russians and many hundreds of thousands of Turks”.
Page 452 “The First World War” – John Keegan, Pimlico 1999
The author does not mention US casualties in this passage but my understanding is they were around 100,000.
Jesus Noel define your sources more succinctly, I among others thought we were talking about WW2 not melding 1&2 together.
Yes the French did their bit in WW1, but they were fighting on home ground, wouldn’t you!
The fact is, without Britain, Russia, the rest of the British Empire and the factory of the world for that last, little cough and a spit,(hence the low body count) the Americans, the French would have been speaking German, even before Adolf had been gassed the first time.
French leaders are not just liars, they are traitors and perverts. If Chirac says anything repressive, I expect even bigger concessions towards the Muslims and Asian leaders, because he is corrupted and France is too indebted to have any independant policy. The same goes for our other leaders Sarkosy, Villepin, and the official left.
Being a non masochist French, I agree with almost everything that’s been said. I laught at Kexington Green opinion about the French. If French animosity towards the Anglo-saxons is true, our international airports are no proof of that since a majority of hostesses “on land” are coloured and people taking “care” of your luggage are almost all of them coloured – which in France means almost always, two passports, two languages, third world culture, no loyalty -, sorry for the exceptions, they know what I mean. Kexington Green, you show common sense while the French prefer to question everything because they’ve been taught during their endless and cheap public studies that it’s a sign of intelligence (“learnance” would be a perfect novlang word for “learning nonsense”). I agree you’re your post (except about these African deaths, so many things in Africa are intricate, stupid and fatal) : those who don’t side with your country are very dangerous for it.
About history matters, I find many common points between the actual French mood and what I could capture about the 30’s. The main difference is that nowadays French people of all age are urged to see an almost free psychiatrist and take some drugs. We are leading psychotropic consumers of the developed world. This is the cost and condition for collective denial.
With Frogman I say “spare a little sympathy for the [occidental] French” because they are being brainwashed 3 hours and 40 minutes everyday by their media and they are about to loose everything. Bourgeois or workers can’t afford their dear food and space anymore (smaller human density on fertile lands).
Only a small conscious minority suffers from the invasion and fears that the allies won’t come for the third time to free Europe. These are looking for their own solution. Even our media recently said that amoung the students wishing to study abroad, 40% wishes to study in the States. The States are by far the favourite destination of our real elite (real scientists for instance) and the French masses buy almost half of their movie tickets to watch American films. To the point that chauvinist French admit that these are the best and comment happily on scenarii that are opposed to the politically correct “French values”. This makes me think that life is stronger than lies.
Thanks to all those who care enough for France or for their own future to gather facts about us.
“I believe that Chirac was not posturing. I believe he fully intends to order a nuclear strike if the government perceives any danger to France.” Verity, I agree absolutely. And I am glad to see it from him.
As to the Pakistani cab drivers, I am sure that I would like them even better if I got to visit them back home in Pakistan. That was my point.
The other thing is, on a merely personal level, I am something of a Francophile. But the media and academia and government over there have postioned themselves as hostile to us, and there is a long tradition of that. I here that French anti-Americanism is the most recent version of French anti-English attitudes, and that French anti-anglo-saxonisme is a permanent, structural element in world politics. Sometimes a common enemy mutes it, but it is always there. We need to conduct ourselves accordingly. And I really do detest the leadership, political and intellecutal, who are too foolish to see that we really do face a dangerous common enemy. And the many ordinary, decent people in France really ought to know better who their real enemies are, and look a little harder at the real world and what is really going on.
As to anyone who says the French are “cowards” or any such nonsense, I wrote this post almost three years ago, and it is still true.
Alice, I was joking about the luggage. They did lose it, and I was angry, and it did badly disrupt my business trip, but I have much more important reasons to be miffed at France than that.
And as I once wrote about Old Europe more generally:
“Evil days have befallen Old Europe. Dull, gray days. The old girl is a pale shadow of her former self. All so unnecessary, so stupid, such a squandering of a great heritage. Wake up, Old Europe. Stop wasting your time trying to make an enemy of your best and only true friend, America. Wake up and be young again. Wake up and be great again.”
Nothing would make me happier than to see common sense prevailing in Europe. And I am too much of a romantic to give up entirely on the prospect of that happening. I get no joy from watching what is happening now. Schadenfreude is a German word, and idea, not an American one. It is heartbreaking to see Europe refuse to have babies, and refuse to face the facts about the world and to wither away in this squalid fashion.
I pray to St. Benedict, Patron of the West, to intercede on behalf of the old girl. She needs all the prayers she can get. The hour is late.
Noel Cooper: I, too, thought that you were referring to WWII………….es tut mir Leid.
Jesus Noel define your sources more succinctly, I among others thought we were talking about WW2 not melding 1&2 together.
Sorry RAB, no intention to deceive but I can see how flitting from one to the other is not helpful. I mentioned WW1 as the greatest contrast with the notion that France has not experienced military success since the revolution, which I stand by.
Yes the French did their bit in WW1, but they were fighting on home ground, wouldn’t you!
The fact is, without Britain, Russia, the rest of the British Empire and the factory of the world for that last, little cough and a spit,(hence the low body count) the Americans, the French would have been speaking German, even before Adolf had been gassed the first time.
Home ground featured in WW2 as well but you are absolutely right in all you say. FWIW I am rather ambivalent when it comes to France, I also do not think France has had a particularly glorious military history in the 20th century. I’ve been prattling on because I disagree with those whose dislike of current French behaviour causes them to denigrate, intentionally or otherwise, the genuine sacrifice of the many French who fought for common cause with this country. Vichy, deportations, Mers el Kebir, yes, much to disparage and rightly so, but what I am seeking (and I think failing – mea culpa) to do is highlight what IMHO is history being distorted and ignored to disparage a nation for it’s current behaviour. This betrays French heroes of 20th century conflict and reminds be somewhat of the tactics of the left with regard to the United States, I don’t like it.
Whoah! Alice! Another hand grenade accurately lobbed! Well said!
But how do you answer the fact that the French hate the Muslims? With the backward, alien culture; their backward, alien people; their agenda of dragging everyone back to the year 700? So why are they there, against the will of the electorate?
From what you say, the government is the peoples’ boss. None of my French friends wanted Muslims in France, or mosques in France.
What do you think about Marine LePen?
Alice and Lexington Green – I am another one who loathes CdGaulle. It’s another of those precious French constructs – a whole airport without signage! How futuristic is that! Are we cute or what? And angry staff who won’t answer questions. Bomb scares where they empty the terminal and stand around, relaxed, laughing, until the police/Gendarmes? turn up in a leisurely fashion and proceed to swap merry quips amongst themselves … while frantic passengers worry about their luggage and, in my case, their cats, who were still inside the terminal. Oh, yawn.
I agree with the horrific cost of French food. I thought England was expensive, compared to the US, but then I went to France and reeled out of supermarkets with my eyes spinning, clutching at the walls and checking my receipt for mistakes. The cost of everything is totally insane. It bears no relationship to reality or to other countries. When I moved to Mexico, after France, the food seemed almost free.
Lexington Green says: And the many ordinary, decent people in France really ought to know better who their real enemies are, and look a little harder at the real world and what is really going on.
Lexington, the ordinary, decent people of France are only too aware of who their real enemies are. I think Alice will back me up. All this Islamic immigration has been imposed on them against their will, and they are well aware that the camel has now worked its way into the tent.
Look for Jean-Marie LePen’s party to get even more mysterious votes – as no one admits to voting for them – in the next election.
Lexington Green, I got your joke on this serious subject. Luggages in Roicy and in Orly are not lost, they are searched by “the youth” as we are only allowed to call them. We have had several scandals on that, and “heavy repression” in the Chirac-Sarkosy style, that is more hiring of members of these “oppressed” communities odiously provoqued by your wealth.
The lowering of the quality of services due to “young” people is ruining us I think, but the traditional French snobbery about anything practical (signs as Verity noticed, services, building industry) made French leftist teachers the ideal masters for third world people.
Ordinary people in France really deny cultural differences and the taboo really prevents them from thinking freely, but things are changing because the news are so distorted that they have become reversed propaganda and also people are beginnig to see daily connections between taxes and immigration.
Mentioning origines in France is very vulgar and can prevent you to get or to keep a job. Being called “racist” by anyboby out of the blue can cause you all kind of troubles, like tacite exclusion justifying unfair treatments and thefts. Most of our social rules are unspoken, so they’re difficult for me to explain.
Millions of robberies are depriving France of important incomes through tourism. Japonese tourist were already avoiding France or shortening their stay, when the riots of november provoqued a diminution of 5% (“only” as our media said) of the touristical cashflow.
I’ve read your old posts, thanks. Saint Benedict, why not ? Children would be the olution.
Verity, I don’t think people are ready to vote for Marine Le Pen and anyway her father will campaign in 2007. Many think that he’s provocatively talks about Jewish subjects because he doesn’t want to be elected. He’s neurotic. And like many French people of all origines he’s far too attracted by the oriental messy culture. A way for some short-sighted employers or deshonest businessmen to feel superior and successfull. Marine Le Pen won’t talk freely before her father is gone and we don’t know her well.
Alice – Thank you. Actually, I was mistakenly under the impression that she had already taken over. No, of course she won’t talk freely until her father is gone – but by then, you will be further down the road to national suicide.
But, regarding the “young people”, the obvious question that no one answers – why?
Of course, that is the same question we ask in Britain about having terrorists living among us, on welfare, with their nine children. (One idea might be, when they give birth, spay them. They’re too ignorant to suspect anything.) And claiming that we need “young” immigrants for the workforce, but they’re all on welfare.
Why?
Bon, bon. As a budding euro chauvunist I’m only happy. French nuclear arms have more style and culture. The beautiful test blast Cassiopee, for instance. And furthermore are french presidents bon vivants. Mitterands mistress and their out-of-wedlock-offspring was invited to his funeral. That’s style! Compare with american presidents who can’t even joyously partake of a cigar in peace and quiet. Or why not the present disaster who feels terrorized by sodomy?
Vive l’empire! Vive les armes nucléaires françaises!
I read Chirac’s statement as the beginning of a campaign to have France replace America in providing a “Nuclear Umbrella” for Europe. I doubt he’ll find many takers…everyone knows France can’t be trusted.
How about the UK’s nuke-umbrella? Is it ununfolded?
Nice one fredrik!
who says Swedes have no sense of humour!?
There won’t be a long cue behind you though, I suspect.
The British nuclear deterrent is currently being re-furbished via the medium of Govt statements rather than nuts and bolts so to speak.
If Iran threatens to attack GB because it can launch WMD’s in 45 mins, then just laugh in they’re face.
We couldn’t launch one in a fortnight!