Occasionally I get in conversations about the French in the 20th century. Sooner or later some clown will refer to the French as "surrender monkeys", or something like that.
My response is always the same: read about the Battle of Verdun.
I am a history buff and it annoys me when the Franks and French army is disrespected. They have about 1500 years of history most of it victorious. The only real stain on their honor was the Vichy French of WW2. I spent time in DeGauls' France in the 60s' and I do not particularly like the French (they don't particularly like us either) but surrender monkeys they are not.
Generalship in WW1 sucked, civilian leadership in pre WW2 sucked, hopefully they are correcting their problems.