A complete military history of France.

[DuncanK]

Originally posted by Spiffor
Don't hesitate If you say "Bonjour... Pouvez vous m'aider" (Hello, could you help me ?) to a Frenchman, he'll immediately love you, even if you continue the discussion in English

Thanx Spiffor. That will come in handy when if I go to France.



... hey, that doesn't mean "go to hell you cheese eating surrender monkey" does it.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Spiffor
Don't hesitate If you say "Bonjour... Pouvez vous m'aider" (Hello, could you help me ?) to a Frenchman, he'll immediately love you, even if you continue the discussion in English

I had 4 years of French in high school, but my teacher was rfrom Georgia. I can only speak french with a sort of southern American accent. It might make you weep to hear it!

[Spiffor]

The more American the accent, the more cuter you are
Seriously, Frenchmen are always flattered when foreigners try to speak our language, especially Americans.

(well, there remains the risk you ask for help to a jerk, still )

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by DuncanK
hey, that doesn't mean "go to hell you cheese eating surrender monkey" does it.

[Pandemoniak]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten

Obelisk of la Concorde -- Standing up
Arabic World Institue -- Standing up
The Great Aqueduct of the Gard -- Standing up

What the hell are these? The joke would've been funnier if you had used some buildings people had actually heard of...

Isn't the Eiffel Tower still around? Or the Arc de Triomphe? I always thought that arch was beautiful; it can even make a parade of Nazi stormtroopers look awe-inspiring.

Yeah, but the Tour Eiffel and the Arc de Triomphe are actually french, .

And my favourites remain the very large statue of Napolean, near Calais, turning his back to England

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by Pandemoniak

And my favourites remain the very large statue of Napolean, near Calais, turning his back to England

Napoleon was just put out by the fact that the English trounced all his efforts against them.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by GePap
How important was the US military involvement (as apart from the economic and political) in WW1 really?

The German Spring offensive was broken by the Second Marne, and that battle was fought by the French and British with, at best, minimal US support. As far as I know, American forces did not begin arriving in quantity by may and june 1918. Also, Germany faced far greater economic pressures than either the Uk or France. After the 1917 mutinies, the French seemed more compossed,and in the west they did not face the creeping starvation one saw in Germany or the Habsburg empire.

The United States had about 500,000 men in France by the end of March 1918. The combat units were technically organized into 5 divisions, but the Allied high command demanded that these troops be distributed among British and French formations. The US was not allowed to field a division sized unit until late April, 1918. The Germans actually launched 5 seperate offensives in the spring of 1918, the last starting in June. US forces in divisional strength were deployed against this offensive and were instrumental in stopping it. By the end of summer 1918 the US had more than one million men in France. Until Americans began arriving in large numbers in the summer of 1918 German troop strength had actually exceeded Allied troop strength on the western front, even after the failed offensives, so it is unlikely that without American reinforcements that the allies would have been able to stage successful counter offensives in 1918. Mind you the high command would have felt obligated to attempt some sort of response to German gains earlier in the year. One wonders what would have happened if the allies had launched inadequately supported offensives in the summer of 1918?

American food definitely helped keep the western allies afloat. Combined Franco-British agriculture by the later years of the war declined. It's hard to say what would have happened if the year of 1918 had been a military disaster for the allies due to a lack of reinforcements AND the allied home economies had not had the addtitional support from the USA. People in Britain and France might not have beeen as famished as the Germans, but in the absence of success they might have become just as desparate.

[Dinner]

Also don't discount the financial and material support the U.S. provided primarially to the allies when it was still technically neutral.

[molly bloom]

Oerdin's history plays fast and loose with facts- the Hundred Years' War after all ended decidely in France's favour, with the 'English'/Plantagenet monarchy becoming a non-mainland monarchy, with the loss of Gascony, Aquitaine and other rich provinces, that had meant so much to the 'English' crown since the days of Eleanore of Aquitaine, and that had provided easy access to Mediterranean art and influences. It ensured a French 'geographical' unity on a par with the Spanish Reconquista, and certainly foreshadowed the French hegemony under Louis Quatorze.

As for France not being a main participant in the Thirty Years War- that must be a relatively new, revisionist finding by some little known historian- one wonders after all, who smashed the power of the Spanish tercios at Rocroi, if not the French? And who ensured the collapse of Spanish power, and ended all hopes of Habsburg domination of Europe, if not Marechal Turenne fighting for Louis Treize and Cardinal Richelieu?

A certain Charles de Gaulle also formulated the idea of 'blitzkrieg' before the Germans, and any list of great military leaders that excluded Turenne or Napoleon (amongst others) would be a list not worth compiling.

Reasons to love France:

Francois Villon, Rabelais, Flaubert, Camembert, Roquefort, flan breton, calvados, Erik Satie, Matisse, Colette, Simone de Beauvoir, Jean Anouilh, Moliere, Rameau, Charpentier, the Auvergne, Cezanne, Degas, Toulouse Lautrec, Victor Hugo, the Quai d'Orsay, brie, madeleines, Edith Piaf, Claude Chabrol, Melville, Albert Camus, Fanny Ardant, Isabelle Huppert, Abelard, Guillaume de Machaut, Eleanor of Aquitaine, bouillabaisse, Georges de la Tour, Chardin, Watteau, Fragonard, l'Orangerie, Monet's garden, Francois Truffaut, fields of lavender in Provence, Les Negresses Vertes, Voltaire, Mont St. Michel, et cetera et cetera...

...and Serge Gainsbourg defiantly singing a reggae version of 'la Marseillaise' despite death threats from right wing elements. Vive la belle France.

[Sandman]

The United States had about 500,000 men in France by the end of March 1918. The combat units were technically organized into 5 divisions, but the Allied high command demanded that these troops be distributed among British and French formations. The US was not allowed to field a division sized unit until late April, 1918. The Germans actually launched 5 seperate offensives in the spring of 1918, the last starting in June. US forces in divisional strength were deployed against this offensive and were instrumental in stopping it.

It has always been my understanding that the German offensives became less effective as time went by as they became more desperate to claw a victory. I don't see how American troops could be 'instrumental' against what were effectively last ditch desperate measures. The casualties from these offensives were immense, often 50% of their elite troops. Each offensive sealed their doom even more.

By the end of summer 1918 the US had more than one million men in France. Until Americans began arriving in large numbers in the summer of 1918 German troop strength had actually exceeded Allied troop strength on the western front, even after the failed offensives, so it is unlikely that without American reinforcements that the allies would have been able to stage successful counter offensives in 1918. Mind you the high command would have felt obligated to attempt some sort of response to German gains earlier in the year. One wonders what would have happened if the allies had launched inadequately supported offensives in the summer of 1918?

I disagree. The Allies had overwhelming artillery, tank and aircraft superiority, which at this point is the deciding factor. If manpower is so all-important, then it would have taken more than a million Americans to put the Allies in complete numerical supremacy, and thus in your view, 'adequately' support offensives.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by molly bloom
Oerdin's history plays fast and loose with facts-

Molly: If you took the time to read the first sentence you'd know I didn't write it. If you took the time to read a few of the previous posts you would also know it is a joke. Yes, that's right Molly; it's not a history text book.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Oerdin


Molly: If you took the time to read the first sentence you'd know I didn't write it. If you took the time to read a few of the previous posts you would also know it is a joke. Yes, that's right Molly; it's not a history text book.

I thought a necessary component of jokes was humour- this was more a case of 'bonjour, tristesse...' or more accurately, 'faiblesse'. Good jokes should have an element of 'truth' in them- like Yiddish humour.

[TheStinger]

Originally posted by Oerdin
Also don't discount the financial and material support the U.S. provided primarially to the allies when it was still technically neutral.

Yes, the UK had to borrow a fortune form the US to fund WW1, and then we had to sell everything we had for WW2. The US in part became an unsurpassed econic superpower by bankrupting Britain.

[Alexander's Horse]

The French have a very proud military tradition. Noone was bashing them when they took part in the Gulf war in 1991.

[Alexander's Horse]

Originally posted by Dr Strangelove


The Germans actually launched 5 seperate offensives in the spring of 1918, the last starting in June. US forces in divisional strength were deployed against this offensive and were instrumental in stopping it.

Actually it was a stand by Australian forces that stopped the German offensive and led directly to the "Black Day" of the German army - at place near Amiens called Villers Bretoneaux - which still celebrates the day they were saved by the Australians to this day.

But please, don't let me interrupt you

Also, it was the French army which held the Germans at bay across most of the Western front for most of the war. This is why after the war the French army was regarded as the best in Europe.