Posted on 08/31/2013 4:08:47 AM PDT by PotatoHeadMick
On June14, 1982, I watched the leading elements of Britain’s task force march wearily but triumphantly into Port Stanley, as the Argentine forces in the Falkland Islands surrendered.
That day, as we can see with painful clarity 31 years later, was the high watermark of British military endeavour since 1945.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
Thankfully British enabling of American nonsense s over.
You should post that in the Mail comments section.
Accomplished historian?.
Hastings is a very over-rated journalist turned ‘historian’ (which he isn’t). His books claim to uncover/shatter myths, but in fact don’t say anything you cant read in much better books by actual UK military historians. They are meant for the mass market history audience.
He is no more an actual historian than Clarkson, who has made some (excellent) historical documentaries for the BBC.
The "Mau Mau" in him did that.
“It’s true, of course. France is the oldest ally of the U.S.A.”
As I recall, Morocco was the first country to recognize the United States in 1777. We also have our longest, unbroken treaty with them. They supported us by granting porting and trading rights to American ships.
Does this mean Morocco is our oldest “ally”? I don’t know, but the history is fascinating. They “allied” with us to the extent their relative powerlessness compared to France allowed.
France is special not only because they provided key military support at the critical moment during the revolution, but because of our shared revolutionary ideology. The American Revolution is in many ways the product of the French Enlightenment. We are revolutionary brothers and it is no accident that both flags are blue, red, and white.
This is why the true American patriot venerates the only foreign Founding Father, General Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de La Fayette; the only Frenchman to command American troops in battle and, arguably, the foreigner most worthy of that distinction.
Humanity has won its battle. Liberty now has a country.
- Marquis de Lafayette
I qualify for DAR because my great, great great...was the aid du camp for Layfette.
Like!
Meanwhile the Brits fought against us, conscripted our men into British military service, and burned Washington. However: all that notwithstanding—as a great Freeper once observe sagely: “If they’ll just come back and burn it again, all will be forgiven.”
This deserves the FR version of retweeting.
“I qualify for DAR because my great, great great...was the aid du camp for Lafayette.”
What a great lineage! You have a direct connection to history. One of the most important things General Lafayette did (and most likely your relative) was smooth over issues that arose between the French and Continental Army. It was a huge thing for us.
Sometimes I think General Lafayette is overlooked in our civic pantheon of founding heroes. My favorite Lafayette quote comes out of WWI. Upon visiting his tomb, General Pershing is reputed to have said:
“Lafayette, we are here.”
Very cool!
Hasting’s work is OK, but there’s a much better crop of historians. John Keegan, Robert Conquest (for all thing’s Soviet), Paul Johnson, and Richard Overy.
For many years it was mandatory that the males of the family, at least once, after prodigious amounts of adult beverage, go down to the statue of Layfette on horseback in the local capitol park and sit on his shoulders.
If there was facebook back then, it would have been facebook moments.
Hastings again parrots the myth that the Argies had just poor, wet, young conscripts. In fact, most of the army were well trained volunteer men and in some cases superbly trained units. Like the 5th Marines at Tumbledown.
I am sick of this myth which manages to insult both the Argentines and the British lads who had to beat them.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argentine_ground_forces_in_the_Falklands_War
“The American Revolution is in many ways the product of the French Enlightenment.”
Do you think so? I can see some elements of contemporary French thinking in the wording of some of the documents of the time but surely the overwhelming guiding influence was the Anglo-Scottish enlightenment, as well as the long history of the British struggle for liberty from tyrants from the British Bill of Rights through the English Civil War right back to Magna Carta?
The French supported the Americans in the Revolutionary War because it was a convenient way of getting a dig in at the British not out of any notion of “liberty”, LaFayette after all served an absolutist monarch who himslef was to have his head removed by revolutionaries.
The French were the enemies of Americans before 1776 and were to be their enemies again later.
The wars between the British and the Americans on the other hand were largely political civil wars between people of the same racial origins and language fighting over how far they were prepared to take the ideas of British political discourse.
Lafayette served in the various French legislatures of the time and died in his bed. Perhaps you have someone else in mind.
It’s a great quip. Why can’t I remember who said it? I’ve been looking through my files but to no avail.
“...surely the overwhelming guiding influence was the Anglo-Scottish enlightenment...”
Indeed. We can say the same thing about Scotland that we say about France for the reasons you cite:
“The American Revolution is in many ways the product of the Scottish Enlightenment.”
And while a discussion on which enlightenment was more influential on American revolutionary thinking is a worthy topic, I hope we can agree that the Scottish and French Enlightenments were centers of thought for a broader, European-wide social movement that included the French aristocracy. Everyone in the “western world” were moving in the same socio-political direction.
We must also remember the politics of the times and the global struggle between France and Britain for world supremacy. Of course, supporting the Americans was a dig at King George. How could a true son of France not strike such a blow against the hated British? The French also supported revolutionaries in Scotland and Ireland for similar reasons.
I don’t know if your characterization of Louis the XVI as an absolute monarchist is quite fair, though the statement is more true than not. Louis spent the early part of his reign pushing for enlightened reforms like abolishing serfdom, but was opposed by the nobility. This in no way implies that Louis was some kind of republican, but it shows the powerful social forces then at play to which even the king himself tried to bend with. We both know things ended badly for Louis.
Correction about Lafayette. He did not serve in America at the king’s behest, at least not at first. In fact, Louis initially forbade him from going. It was only later when the French intervened that he began his intermediary role.
You are right to say that the French were American enemies before 1776, while we were still “British” and it was only a few years after independence that the United States became involved in an undeclared naval war against France, then a war with Britain again, commonly referred to at the time as the 2nd American Revolution. Veterans of the Nepoleonic Wars, the British kicked American butt (ouch!).
Your post got me thinking about the British/American special alliance and how it evolved. I can go back to WWI, but cannot think of anything before this. Does successfully negotiating the Canadian border count for anything? With some exceptions, the first 100+ years of American history were spent chasing Manifest Destiny. Our eyes were turned inward. When we finally stepped out onto the world stage in earnest, Great Britain was much changed, although still an imperial colonial power.
The true defining moment for our special relationship with Britain in my mind is WWII. We cooperated on the atomic bomb and other projects with unprecedented openness. Our intelligence services were woven together to a certain extent. We must give credit to Prime Minister Churchill and President Roosevelt (sorry FReepers, but we must give credit where it is due).
Last thing about Great Britain - Thank God the United States had enemies like them; a stubborn yet fair-minded, practical people, that can be trusted to keep their word and is willing to say right is right even when it goes against them - This includes the Welsh, English and Scotts. We salute you.
“If there was facebook back then...”
...you’d have 120 million hits on youtube, right behind the funny cat video.
It is great! Sad that we want DC emptied but we do.
I was referring to the king, rather obviously. If I had been referring to LaFayette I would have inserted a comma after the word “king” and wrote “and” following the comma.
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