Posted on 12/03/2002 6:26:56 PM PST by Sungirl
I don't know how true this is, but it makes a good story.
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France Meets the USMC -- or -- A U. S. Marine in Bosnia
A funny thing happened to me yesterday at Camp Bondsteel (Bosnia):
A French army officer walked up to me in the PX, and told me he thought we (Americans) were a bunch of cowboys and were going to provoke a war. He said if such a thing happens, we wouldn't be able to count of the support of France.
I told him that it didn't surprise me. Since we had come to France's rescue in World War I, World War II, Vietnam, and the Cold War, their ingratitude and jealousy was due to surface at some point in the near future anyway.
That is why France is a third-rate military power with a socialist economy and a bunch of wimps for soldiers.
I additionally told him that America, being a nation of deeds and action, not words, would do whatever it had to do, and France's support was only for show anyway. Just like in ALL NATO exercises, the US would shoulder 85% of the burden, as evidenced by the fact that the French officer was shopping in the American PX, and not the other way around.
He began to get belligerent at that point, and I told him if he would like to, I would meet him outside in front of the Burger King and beat his behind in front of the entire Multi-National Brigade East, thus demonstrating that even the smallest American had more fight in him than the average Frenchman.
He called me a barbarian cowboy and walked away in a huff.
With friends like these, who needs enemies?
Mary Beth Johnson
LtCol, USMC
Admiral de Grasse merely showed up at Chesapeake Bay. Bad strategery on the part of British Admirals Hood and Graves and General Clinton forced Cornwallis to yield Yorktown.
The French contribution to our independence was miniscule....
Not only that, it was done in THEIR interest against the English, not for our benefit.
A truly silly sense of history. If we not rescued the French (and the rest of Europe) in WW1 (and the war was completely lost until we entered it), there would be no France for later.
>We did help them out in World War II,
"Help them out", Hell, the war in Europe was completely lost until we again entered it!
> but the US also can share much of the blame for creating the conditions for World War II with the onerous conditions we placed upon Germany after WWI.
Whine, whine, whine... Do someone a favour and what do you get in return. Whine, whine, whine. It's never good enough, is it. No good deed goes unpunished.
Yes, the french did help us a couple hundred years ago but what do you think Eddie Richenbacker and the 94th Aero Squadron were doing over there in WW I, if not helping the french? I don't know what you could call such help if not a rescue.
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