Why do we hate the french again?

[Silent]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

So you (and Silent) are saying that if we had followed the french example of fighting in the trenches we wouldn't have had their 76% casualty rate and the war would have ended soon any way? Grow up. Pershing may have been decimated 2 years earlier but it wasn't 2 years earlier, was it? Pershing did the right thing for and at the right time. He ended the war quickly with a casualty rate of 8%. :p

I don't think I said anything of the sort.
My main points were/are:

1) Pershings tactics were out dated by 1918. The only reason they suceeded was due to the Americans being aligned against a tired, decimated German army.
2) Do not credit Pershing with any sort of insight with his choice of these out moded tactics. Being in the right place at the right time is not military genius, it's luck.
3) French tactics by 1918 were not as evolved as German or Canadian tactics. I am not holding them up as an example of elite WWI infantry.
4) Do not quote casualty rates from the entire war and expect the to have any real significance. Had the Americans been in the conflict from 1914 fighting a fresh German army without the lessons of the previous 4 years of fighting, I'm sure their casualty rates would have been right up there.
5) Do not attempt to say "Pershing ended the war". He was supporting cast. An important part, yes, but the forces which defeated the bulk and elite of the German army of 1918 were not American.

You know, I think the reason that a lot Americans have this hate on for the French is that many French have an open disdain for Americans.
And why do the French have this disdain for Americans? A couple of reasons:
1) Americans tourists have the worst reputation for being ignorant, arrogant loud mouths. Having witnessed first hand some of what that's is based on, I can't say that it is entirely un-earned.
2) The French have an insecurity about themselves. They are as proud of their country as Amercans are about theirs, but loss of international prestige, the diminishing importance of the French language, and the fact that their pride has taken a couple of stiff blows in the last century, has resulted in them attempting to take any comfort they can about themselves.

The above is just my opinion garnered from traveling abroad.

And I'm not trying to defend the French. I think their knee-jerk anti-americanism is childish. But I also think that whole "Freedom Fry" thing was infantile too.
I've actually heard Americans say that the French are ungrateful after they "saved their asses". :
Never has America gone to war to save France. The fact that the Germans were removed from French soil was mere pragmatism. France was the easiest route to get at the Germans.
And as far as the French were concerned, it was just pay back for the help they gave during the American Revolution.