Posted on 06/01/2004 9:45:56 AM PDT by Eurotwit
Look at history. The French should learn some modesty, and quickly, writes Gerard Henderson.
Next Sunday marks the 60th anniversary of the D-day landings at Normandy in north-western France, which began the liberation of much of western Europe from Nazi Germany rule. George Bush and Tony Blair will be present at the commemoration. John Howard will have a minor role.
And naturally, France will be represented on June 6, by its President, Jacques Chirac.
At a time when the "give-peace-a-chance" mantra is once again prevalent, it is worth recording that Adolf Hitler's regime was crushed by military force and that the D-day landings were led by the Americans and the British. No member of any pacifist society, nor any member of any international organisation, ever troubled Hitler's Reich. What's more, despite Charles de Gaulle's attempt to rewrite history, the French played only a small part in their nation's liberation in 1944 and 1945.
The presence of so many leaders at the one place provides an occasion for some discussions about Iraq in the lead-up to the handover of authority to Iraqis. There is still a degree of tension between Bush and Chirac concerning France's announcement in early 2003 that it would veto any United Nations Security Council resolution that would have facilitated an invasion of Iraq.
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Advertisement This is understandable - from the coalition of the willing's perspective. In early 2003, Chirac's Government believed that Saddam Hussein's regime had weapons of mass destruction. By refusing to support the stance of Bush and Blair, France effectively sent a message to Saddam that he had little reason to fear an invasion. That is, if Iraq had WMD it could keep them - for the short term, at least. And if it did not have WMD, there was no reason to abide by numerous mandatory Security Council resolutions and declare this.
Despite the deteriorating security situation in Iraq, there have been scant "I-told-you-so" refrains from the Elysee Palace in recent months. This possibly reflects a view in France that Chirac went over the top with his criticisms of the Bush Administration in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq. Whatever the extent of Chirac's evident dislike of Bush, it is not in France's national interest to see Iraq dissolve into civil war or anarchy.
Last year Chirac gave megalomania a real nudge. During the course of a few months, the French President criticised the US, lectured Britain and dressed down the new members of the European Union from central and eastern Europe. For all Chirac's grandstanding in 2003, the French conservatives did poorly in France's regional elections last March.
The events of June 6 serve as a reminder of the fact that, over the past century or so, French governments have spoken loudly but carried a small stick. France fought bravely to turn back the German invasion in 1914 but by 1917 its military forces were of little consequence. The German Army was defeated in the field in late 1918 primarily by Commonwealth nations. The US decision to enter the war in 1917 also put pressure on the German High Command.
In 1940 France was defeated by Germany. There followed wide-scale collaboration in both the German occupied zone (that is, in the north-west, centred on Paris) and the unoccupied zone (that is, in the south, centred on Vichy). The degree of collaboration - which included the deportation of tens of thousands of French Jews to Nazi death camps in the east - was effectively ignored for decades after the war.
The extent of collaboration - on both the right and left of French politics - was first revealed by the American historian Robert Paxton in the early 1970s. Recent works in this genre include Adam Nossiter's France and the Nazis, Robert Gildea's Marianne in Chains and Michael Curtis's Verdict on Vichy. Certainly there was some resistance, but this mainly became a factor as a German defeat (on both the eastern and western fronts) seemed evident.
Just a decade after June 6, 1944, the French were defeated by Vietnamese communist forces at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu. Some 60,000 French troops died in Indochina before the surrender on May 7, 1954. Subsequently, despite the presence of more than 500,000 troops, the French withdrew defeated from Algeria in 1962.
French colonialism expired - first in Vietnam, then in Algeria - in just a decade.
Some Indochinese settled successfully in France. Not so the 5 million Muslims (about 10 per cent of France's population) who live in France after France's unsuccessful attempt at colonising parts of North Africa. Critics of multiculturalism in Australia and elsewhere would be well advised to look at the problems caused when migrant groups are not welcomed into a society. Today parts of Paris and some other major French cities are effectively no-go areas for police and security forces.
There has been a long-term anti-Semitic tradition in France, historically stemming from the right. This intolerance has now been accentuated by an influx of anti-Semites from North Africa. The unpleasant reality is well documented in Marie Brenner's essay in the new edited collection Those Who Forget the Past.
Add to all this the fact that the over-regulated French economy is holding back European economic growth, and it is evident that President Chirac is in no position to lecture the world. Especially in foreign policy, where France preaches multilateralism to the US and Britain but practises unilateralism when it sees fit - in Rwanda (on the wrong side of the civil war), the Ivory Coast and even New Zealand (remember France's terrorist attack on the Rainbow Warrior in Auckland Harbour?).
Here's hoping that D-day 2004 kick-starts some modesty on the part of the French political class. But don't bet on it.
I hope the French learn modesty they are agrorant people Frogs listen SHUT YOUR PIEHOLE And know your role I respect country that don't surrender to Facisism and Tailban
HELLO
I watched the A&E movie "Ike" with Tom Selleck yesterday. It did some major DeGaulle bashing-too funny! Every nation involved in the invasion was backing Ike except the country being liberated. I wonder if Ike ever considered an invasion plan that bypassed France!
Mark Steyn in his Memorial Day piece: "Like the French Resistance, tiny in its day but of apparently unlimited manpower since the war ended......."
Wifey and I loved that part!
There will be no modesty on the part of Chirac et al. They were making money (a lot!) from the Iraq status quo and had no interest in toppling Saddam.
The French have the peculiar distinction of being non-players even in their own history!
Yeah. In a dress. :)
Reminds me of a great joke:
Why do the French line their roads with trees?
So their conquerors can march in the shade.
Ah, but their new Arab conquerors prefer the sun, so the trees will be removed!
I saw the movie, too. It was very good. Especially the part where they are watching the film showing Polish resistance to the Nazi's and it is pointed that these starving people held resistance for six weeks, and Gen. Beadle Smith says, "That's twice as long as the well-fed French army."
The presence of so many Western Leaders in one location provide an excellent opportunity for an act of terrorism.
I took a dump this morning and called it France.
We still need to put up that billboard outside the US embassy in Paris: The next time you folks get conquered by the Germans, we are not coming! (in grammatical french, of course)
The President should bring back every US fighting man buried in France, they are being shamed by being left in the 'land of the cowards'.
"Ike" was a very interesting movie. I find it interesting that my opinion of the French wouldn't be so low if I hadn't visited one of their own museums, the Peace Memorial in Caen, which made their capitulation to the Nazis all-too-apparent. What a bunch of weasels.
Link to the article:
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/05/31/1085855495277.html
"Ike" was one of the finest movies I have viewed in over a decade! Selleck was magnificent, and the parallels with today's events were uncanny. It is definitely a "must see" event!
LLS
A distinction without a difference. What passes for "right" or "conservative" in France is merely a somewhat more dilute form of Socialism than the French leftists espouse. Perhaps the French "right" wants to hang onto a bit of French sovereignty while the left wants to surrender it all to the socialist central European government. The Marxist-Communist state that failed under the Soviets is now being reconfigured in central Europe, to be run, but of course, by the French, German and Belgian left.
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