I have no quarrel nor any dislike for the French people. In my many visits to France over the years, I have found them generally to be very kind, deeply interested in les Americain, and friendly — except for the strangely anti-American breed that frequents the heart of Paris and will take a visiting Yank for every buck in his wallet if he can.
No, it’s not the French people who are the problem. It’s the French leadership over the years that has earned my anger — and that of all other Americans who are upset over France’s abominable action or lack of action in the case of the U.S. decision to invade Iraq, along with many other nations that recognized the need to act in the Middle East.
Fortunately, President Nicolas Sarkozy, the new French leader, is trying to mend the shattered French-American relations. But the anti-American contingent is still in the saddle in Paris. I should say that France’s leadership hasn’t been alone in drawing our anger. Germany and Russia share our disdain, as well.
However, I have a bone to pick with those Americans who insist that France, Germany, and Russia were right in withholding support for our action in Iraq. One might have expected Germany and Russia to hold out. But France….?
French officials apparently have extremely short memories. Twice in the 20th Century, American military forces had to cross the Atlantic to rescue the French from German hordes that were on the verge of defeating them and taking over their nation. And in each war, thousands of Americans died and many more thousands were wounded.
Add to that another sorry chapter in the 20th Century — our decision to send a large military force to Vietnam in an effort to salvage the mess the French had created there before withdrawing in haste. There, too, the number of Americans killed and wounded was severe.
Three times, then, in a single century, the U.S. went to the aid of the French and suffered great losses for its efforts. Then, at the beginning of the 21st Century, when the U.S. sought the support of France in a war on terrorism and a Hitler-like tyrant in Iraq, the French reneged and insisted it was a job for the United Nations — despite the fact that the U.N. refused to approve direct action.
Many voices in the American news media — voices that should have known better — sided with the French and heaped criticism on President Bush for doing what the French, Germany, Russia, and the U.N. had failed to do.
I have another and an even more disturbing bone to pick with those misguided voices in the news media: Why have they failed to look into and report the suspicious ties France, Germany, and Russia had with Saddam Hussein and Iraq? Those nations were supplying Saddam with weapons of war, including nuclear materials.
It seems probable that the three European countries refused to act against Saddam because they had money-making trade deals with him. And these Europeans accuse the U.S. of doing anything for a buck!
