I just can’t beat up on the french, there were brave
frenchmen in both wars and in the First world war they
suffered horrendous casualties. Had the US suffered the
same numbers as Verdun we would have been torn apart too
the second time.
The offer to fly the U.S. vets to France was made, and then withdrawn. That’s a present day decision made by an official in the current French government.
We have the right to know who in France made that decision, and does the office of the French president approve. Our embassy should be demanding to know, right now.
They were wiped out almost to a man in the big battles. The cowards, the unfit, and the few survivors bred the next generation. That's the problem.
The battle of Verdun was horrific. I have been to the battlefield which still shows the effects of that fight. A Frenchman was quoted as saying; “they will never get us to do that again.”(Referring to the battle.)
The experiences of the French in WWI were why they didn’t fight in WWII; they felt betrayed by politicians in the first war, who had spent the soldiers’ lives recklessly. It isn’t coincidence that the man who fixed the mutinous French army in 1917 (Marshal Petain) led the Vichy government in WWII; they were neutral, and he wanted it kept that way to avoid the loss of life from the first war.