I just want to know what people think about France. Are they ungrateful? Did they really want to speak German? And what about the French attorney that wants to represent Sadaam?
The French have been cast as the villains by an administration so incompetent at diplomacy that Kruschev would have been embarrassed. The French did not threaten to veto any new UNSC resolution on Iraq, they merely (rightly) insisted that Hans Blix finish his work. It did not have any “arrangement” with Saddam beyond a UN mandated oil-for-food/medicine programme (which, sadly, Iraqi officials corrupted completely by selling the food/medicine on the black market).
The attempt by the current US administration to divert attention onto the French would only work on utterly credulous fools.
What’s the debate here? Or are you just looking for Opinions? Would Humble Opinions suit you? What about My Humble Opinion? If only there were a forum called “In My Humble Opinion” set up for polls and asking for opinions…
:eek: Look! There is! It’s right below Cafe Society and right above MPSIMS!
so, one attorney who wants to represent Saddam (actually, I think the guy you are thinking of is Italian, Giovanni Di Stefano) and you think it is a reflection on an entire country?
they don’t want to speak German (I have no idea where you are getting that from, unless it is some sort of dig at the EU.)
Ungrateful? do they owe something to you?
I didn’t hear about the french attorney who wants to defend Saddam Hussein, but I’m going to give it a go :
Could it be Jacques Verges?
I’m not sure why I am acknowledging this post with a reply, but what the hell.
I think the French are people who live in a country known as “France” in western Europe, and they have a funny language where they don’t pronounce half the letters but everyone thinks it is cool because it sounds flowery.
As to your specific questions, exactly how long do they need to pay pennance to Britain and America by blindly agreeing with every policy and ideology presented to them? I mean, is there a date where they can start disagreeing with us without being ridiculed for being “ungrateful?” Was Pershing doing the right thing being grateful to France in 1917? When you extinguish someone on fire (even though you’ve been igoring them smoldering for 10 minutes), do they have to be your slave? Do you live on the Brady Bunch? Should Poland be bowing down to Russia for “liberating” them, or do they have a right to protest being raped for 50 years?
Did they want to speak German? Why? Everyone likes French, even the Russians, who have a cooler alphabet. Considering that France and Germany had been fighting on and off for over a thousand years, it isn’t anything new. Germany invaded France three freaking times in 80 years. Maybe your question should be rephrased, “Why do Germans want the French to speak German?”
The French attorney… he’s an attorney. It is easier and more accurate to make the blanket statement that lawyers are scum than the French are scum. Even if he loses, he’ll get all kinds of publicity.
As for Saddam, we can (and have) argued until we’re blue in the face about France’s (not to mention the rest of the planet’s) motivations for resisting the war, arguably that they supplied and supported Saddam for decades and had the most lucartive contracts with him. However, making assumptions like this is a gross generalization, assuming that every individual person in France has an interest in supplying contracts with Saddam, as opposed to big French companies.
The real question is why you are so concerned about France. The French government screws up enough on its own to need help from Americans bitter that someone dare disagree with them.
None other.
Tell us more about him, please - and I have a feeling we’ll have to hurry if we want to get any more posts into this thread.
For shame. Guest comes in asking questions and all that is given is a bunch of sneering ripostes. What is this, Paris cafe’?
Ungrateful? I wouldn’t go there. Find something to read on how US left France hanging against Hitler in the summer of 1940. French didn’t just capitulate, they were fighting for more than a month, suffering terrible casualties, while begging US to declare war on Hitler. Not to send troops, just declare which side US was on. After US repeatedly refused, French finally sued for peace. Witnesses describe how occupied Paris was unusually quite and somber, the only display of emotions was visible when US diplomatic limousine was driving through the streets on the way to meet a German commandant: people would start shouting, shaking fists and throwing things.
Speak German? Invraisemblable!
French attorney beat Geragos to represent Saddam? We are losing the edge.
You, once again, must have missed all his other posts. At least you seem to be avoiding the “the French are evil” rhetoric, which is promising.
French soldiers are fighting and dying side by side with Americans in Afghanistan. I think the current fashion for bad-mouthing the French is disgusting.
No, the guy is French. I think the French owe some respect to England and the United States. France had a Nazi flag flying in Paris. Were they going to take it down themselves???
By The Associated Press
PARIS (March 28) - A French lawyer who claims to be representing Saddam Hussein said Sunday he doesn’t think there will be a trial for a long time and criticized President Bush for pronouncing the former dictator guilty of atrocities.
Jacques Verges said he believes the United States has violated the Geneva Conventions on several counts in its detention of Saddam, and said the world must wait for a trial to determine what Saddam did wrong.
"We know that Mr. Bush has said he’s guilty,’’ Verges told Associated Press Television News. "But what does that mean? Mr. Bush is not a judge. We cannot accept him as a judge. He is an enemy of Saddam Hussein.’’ […]
[Edited down due to copyrighted concerns. Post links or SHORT excerpts only, please. --Gaudere]
And what’s wrong with my other post?
I couldn’t add anything of any value to this article. Verges is one of the most famous french lawyer (if not the most famous) precisely because he always volunteers for the most hopeless and controversial cases, as long as they involve politics (He would defend terrorists, not baby-rapists). I’m not sure he ever had a client acquited during his career, but he always turns the trial in a political show.
I’d bet his defense line (assuming that he will actually act as a defense lawyer) wil be along the line “My client commited awful crimes, but all of his accusators are accomplices of his crimes/did the same/are worst than him, and should be tried too along with him. Why aren’t they here?” (and I would say he probably would have some point) . I wouldn’t be surprised if he called as witnesses half the current and past world’s leaders. He’s not in his prime, and such a trial would be the crowning of his career.
He has been accused of antisemitism in the past , but I couldn’t tell if it’s well founded or simply related to the accused he choose to represent.
I generally agree, however its a different matter once you get down to specific examples like Karen Hughes. Some of the French-born truly are scum. You could probably say the same for any nationality.
Y’know, we could probably greatly improve our current situation by pulling out of Iraq and invading France!
I mean, think about it: we KNOW we can march in there and take the whole country in about fifteen minutes, right?
We’ll get about the same amount of oil out of France that we’re getting out of Iraq, right?
Halliburton can continue to cornhole the American taxpayer in France, same as they’re doing in Iraq, right?
Public opinion is so anti-French right now in America that it’d certainly be more popular, right?
…of course, there is the matter of the Free French and the French Resistance during WWII. Certainly, not ALL the French rolled over for the Nazis.
This would seem to imply that the locals would run into the woods and snipe at our soldiers as they carried out their occupation duties. And they’d blow up our transportation, attack our supply convoys, encourage riots in towns and cities, work on making it a war of attrition…
…hey, wait a minute… :smack:
I’ve posted 400 times on this board and never said a single bigoted word about people of any nationality.
Tais-toi, salope!
Who is making bigoted comments??? I haven’t heard any except jokingly.
Taking a page right from our good buddy Milosovec’s self-representation.
Please, can we move beyond this kind of asinine rhetoric now? The French don’t “owe” anyone anything. Just because we eventually got around to liberating France almost 60 years ago doesn’t mean that they owe us a life-debt like a Wookie. Tons of countries were liberated from the Nazis (and Japanese, though I’d hesitate to say Italians, since they didn’t really conquer anyone). It doesn’t mean that they owe their liberators undying support. If they disagree with us, they disagree with us - what, you can’t get along with someone who disagrees with you? It is possible to do so and remain friendly with someone.
Like I said, does all of Eastern Europe owe unwavering support to the Rodina-mat’? Hardly. Russia screwed them for it.
Get over the whole “France was a helpless blonde tied to the railroad tracks by the wily villain with the twisty mustache until the heroic Americans came and saved them, foiling his evil plot” thinking. As somoene above mentioned, France fought their little hearts out when Germany invaded them. Unfortunately, they were vastly ill-prepared for modern warfare and got steamrolled, in part thanks to the fact that their savior America largely sat back and whistled innocently. I mean, at least Britain showed some balls and tried to step to the plate with France.
I think you are VASTLY overestimating the capabilities of the French to overthrow the German occupation. While it is true that good parts of France capitulated, it is also largely true that they didn’t have much choice in the matter. It is also true that another good chunk of French citizens, not to mention the other occupied territories maintained a strong resistance underground that vastly aided in intelligence and manuevers once the other Allies were able to help (neverminding that most of those Poles were promptly shot in the head as thanks).
In fact, the French citizens had about as much chance of overthrowing the German invaders as the Iraqi rebels have of kicking out America, which is to say, none at all. They faced a well oiled and professional military superpower that controlled all aspects of government and life, was vastly militarily superior, and were cut off from friendly forces. Any effort to, as you put it, “take down the Nazi flag in Paris” would have been and was met with being shot in the face. You make it sound like a random uprising of a few thousand unorganized civilians armed with a few dozen WWI-era rifles could have overthrown the most powerful military the world had ever seen, as opposed to being brutally murdered in the streets and having their city bombed to dust.
Were the Vichy French wrong? In hindsight, sure. Of course, their uncooperation would have resulted in a stronger military state and a lot more dead people. Look at the recent history of Europe - you have the Franco-Prussian War, WWI… each were instances of Germany invading with goals other than controlling France. It could be strongly argued that the Nazis took out France only to ensure that they had a 1-front war with the Soviets, not out of interest of controlling France itself. It can easily be seen how cooperation would be a safer move. Maybe they assumed that once the war was over, Germany would take Alsace-Lorraine and other territories and leave them be. Given an option between utter annihilation of their state and way of life (and lives), and cooperating with an invading dictatorship, they made their choice.
It is rather simple to sit back and blame France from an American point of view. America hasn’t faced a (real) invasion since, arguably, 1812. We don’t know what it is like to be occupied, we don’t even know what it is like to face an agressive superior military power on our border (though for a long time, Mexico was rated as stronger than America).
And now, we have the gall (semi-pun intended) to sit back and scream at them for not supporting our whacko insane plots of invading and occupying random countries, and expecting them to not only support us, but to dedicate troops?
Unlike West Germany, we didn’t CONQUER France, we LIBERATED France. We gave them the liberty to make these kinds of choices and decisions for themselves, and heckling them for exercising that liberty now is absurd and asinine. I am ashamed that it is even brought up (along with the outrage that Spain withdraws troops on ONLY 90% of the population’s demands).
The American ego is astounding.
I think the Americans owe some respect to France. The United States had a British flag flying in Philadelphia. Were they going to take it down and gain independence themselves?
I didn’t say you did, I said you were avoiding that kind of rhetoric, moi drug.