The French are no longer redefining Overlord

John.

“These debates, as interesting as they are, are pointless unless we first accurately read and then quote what other contributors actually write rather than what we imagine they write! “

Your exact words…..

” I’ll stick to my point that more French soldiers and sailors (don’t know about the Airforce) fought for the Germans than fought for the Allies.”

So, again, where are the figures to support your contention? Not the title of the book but the figures quoted therein. On the 10th of May 1940 France had, your figure, “around 4 repeat 4 million men” under arms. Were they not fighting with the BEF and the Belgians against the invading German forces? Were the 120,000 killed, 250,000 wounded just creatively invented statistics?

And as for my creatively invented stats, they are from this source – World War Two Databook, John Ellis, ISBN 1 85410 254 0.

Regards,

kev35

So why not get on your motor bike and shove of there.I am British and proud of my country faults and all and I am heartily sick of you constant carping on about it being a sh*thole. Go and burn some sheep of blockade a channel port or fight with the CRS!

Good for you Paul, I’m glad you’re happy.

Well 13 French airmen fought in the Battle of Britain,must have tipped it in our favour!

I love this General Forum most can’t spot a wind up:rolleyes:

To Andy your quote,
“I’ve spent a lot of time amongst the French, it’s better than here.
It’s not perfect by any means, but this country is dead–full of f*ckwits, wannabe’s and hangers on, the indolent, people who think the Daily Mail is real, and people who can’t cook, or wipe their own ar*e most likely”

So why not get on your motor bike and shove of there.I am British and proud of my country faults and all and I am heartily sick of you constant carping on about it being a sh*thole. Go and burn some sheep of blockade a channel port or fight with the CRS!

Kev please,

Please read accurately. I did not write that 4.5 million French fought for the Germans. I don’t know how many actually took up arms against the Allies thus effectively fighting for the Germans.

What I wrote was that the French in 1939 had the largest army in the world around 4 repeat 4 million men armed and allegedly ready to fight – only they weren’t.

In an earlier comment, I mentioned a history of the Vichy French and their actions in support of the Axis powers. I’m waiting for confirmation of the title, the author and the ISBN. The facts are contained within. This book is the source of my information. Until reading it, like most, I had no idea just how collaborationist the French were. I’d heard some stories but that was all. I’ll let you know just as soon as I know.

I could creatively invent stats till the cows come home but, I won’t. Let this book speak for itself.

These debates, as interesting as they are, are pointless unless we first accurately read and then quote what other contributors actually write rather than what we imagine they write!

John.

I see no evidence from you to back your contention that more French soldiers and sailors fought for the axis than the allies. Without evidence, all you are offering is a (stereotypical) opinion, and as such it is frankly worthless in the course of any debate. The statistics I have offered may not impress you much, but they are at least an attempt to back my argument. You could extend the courtesy of doing the same. I look forward to seeing the evidence that more than 4.5 million Frenchmen fought for the axis, though I doubt it will be forthcoming.

Regards,

kev35

Oh dear ! Oh dear!,

This one will open up some divisions that’s for sure. I’ll stick to my point that more French soldiers and sailors (don’t know about the Airforce) fought for the Germans than fought for the Allies. That does not include the numbers of French collaborators or those responsible for the removal of more Jews from France to the death camps than from any other country in Western Europe.

The prospect and reality of British collaboration is the subject of another debate. Similarly, if we’d been occupied, how we the British would have dealt with privations etc.

Dunkirk wasn’t an option it was a necessity made so by the collapse of the Belgium Army and the ineffectual attempts by the ineffectual French leadership of the largest army in the world (4 million men under arms) albeit with a Maginot Line mentality who failed to fight tooth and nail for their country despite possessing an armoured corps with more tanks that were bigger and better than that possessed by any other army in the world.

The firsr World War had closed with a substantial portion of the French Army in mutiny and that condition appeared to have rolled over to the opening months of the second World War. There was next to no appetite in the French Army to fight. Once the Maginot Line was outflanked, the French were doomed. Dunkirk became a necessity. If one’s country is threatened with occupation then you fight to the death to avoid slavery and serfdom. Because a slave and a serf is what you will become.

Over the years I’ve spent much time in France; the South rather than the North. I’ve met very pleasant French people and the occasional sour one – just like any where else. Even so, I’m at a loss to explain the French Navy’s decision not to sail some of their very modern warships into British ports and join the fight or, into neutral ports outside of possible German control thus necessitating the attack at Oran. What was the French Govt. thinking of?

The only possible explanation, apart from what they saw as the loss of pride and face in merging with the Royal Navy was that they incorrectly thought that Britain would meekly surrender just as they had. Hmm!

Kev, your statistics do not impress. 4 million men under arms and well armed with the right kind of determination should have seen off the Germans without our help. Numbers do not much matter. The fact that the Vichy French could even think of taking up arms against their former comrades-in-arms let alone actually do so, is wholly shameful.

As a defeated nation, I’m still surprised that the French were allocated a share of the victors spoils in the division of Berlin at the end of the last war. Must have been due to Churchill’s magnanimity.

And I was going to add to expand on one of Kev’s points earlier.

We have no idea how we would have dealt with a German occupation. How many British would have collaborated. How would British phlegm have dealt with the privations most of occupied France endured? And how long would it have lasted, since we would have lost the war? How would the UK have been absorbed into the Reich?

We simply cannot know and although British, I find it offensive to see the French represented in the way they have been by some members here. And as Kev said, we did indeed leave the French to fend themselves in 1940.

There’s something shameful going on John, that’s for sure.

Just take a look at the campaign in France between the 10th of May 1940 and the French capitulation. 120,000 French soldiers were killed or missing, some 250,000 were wounded and 1,450,000 were made PoW. Compare that to the BEF’s losses of 11,010 killed and missing, 14,070 wounded and 41,340 captured. These figures belie the impression that Frenchmen didn’t fight. Some 600,000 Frenchmen fought FOR the Allies in exile. Of those some 30,000 were killed, 85,000 were wounded and 6,000 were made prisoner. Approximately 20,000 members of the Resistance and the Maquis were killed. And almost half a million French civilians were killed and wounded, more than a few of those casualties occurred as a result of Allied actions.

But it goes deeper than than that. A Country under occupation. An occupation this Country never experienced, at least in part due to the fact that some 338,000 British and French soldiers were spirited away from the beaches of Dunkirk. The French might suggest that they suffered an occupation at least partly due to the fact that 338,000 British and french soldiers ran away. It’s all about perception. As part of that occupation it is common knowledge the privations the French population endured. The population of the UK were never forced to collaborate under duress. What do you honestly think the average Frenchman is going to do when he is told he will follow orders or his entire family will be sent East into forced labour?

You cite some examples of Vichy Forces fighting against the Allies and there is no doubt that happened. It is also true that an entire Groupe de Bombardement, operating under Vichy control, deliberately missed Gibraltar when tasked with bombing targets located there.

It is disingenuous in the extreme to tar all with the same brush.

Regards,

kev35

No Andy,

Contrary to you polite opinion it isn’t ‘rowlocks’. Read your WW2 history there’s a good bloke. More French opposed the Allies thereby supporting the Germans than fought for the Allies. I include the samples you mention – Free French etc. Here are some locations where the French opposed the Allies, primarily the British:

Oran
Dakar (Free French as well as others)
Syria
Lebanon
North Africa (Algiers)
Madagascar

Pretty shameful eh! There is available a very good book which gives the ‘lowdown’. I’ll give the title later.

As an ex para I will say what I have thought about the French. “cheese eating surrender monkeys!”

I don’t give a stuff if people are annoyed. Read the history of Pegasus Bridge first!

French, like other nationalities have had their ups and downs in military prowess,
Washington’s army wasnt much to write home about, but at least they kept running until the french came

Moggy – I too am aware of that. My comments were directed towards paul178’s post, not the petition.

Moggy.
Yes, I did realise that.
It seems that it’s similar to what you get in many cases here, some modern tourism ‘expert’ with little or no knowledge of history drawing lines on a map, or re-writing history in a convenient and easy way for the masses to grasp, to help make money out of history.
Many French people seemingly don’t approve either.

As have I, Andy, and resent this typically English anti-French garbage usually seen in the tabloid pages.

Can I just point out that the petition is launched by French people who resent the history of the war being rewritten to suit a sector of the débarquement industry* not the trashy UK tabloid

Dear *****,

Thanks for signing my petition, “Suppression du secteur mythique des plages du débarquement.”

Can you help this petition win by asking your friends to sign too? It’s easy to share with your friends on Facebook – just click here to share the petition on Facebook.

There’s also a sample email below that you can forward to your friends.

Thanks again — together we’re making change happen,

Marc LAURENCEAU

Moggy

* Because make no mistake, that is what it is

My impression is that the French never forgave the British for carrying on the fight after they had been conquered.

John, that’s b*llocks and you know it.
As Kev said, what about all the Free French who were in the Royal Air Force, or the Soviet air force, or the 8th Army, or for that matter the rearguard at Dunkirk..?
Do you really think if there had been a land connection between Britain and the rest of Europe in May 1940, Uncle Adolf and his chums would have stopped–or for that matter, the British army would have stopped them..? As the bard of Stratford said: “This precious stone set in the silver sea,
Which serves it in the office of a wall, Or as a moat defensive to a house, Against the envy of less happier lands…”

Both countries had under-spent on the military since 1918–and paid the price.
And there were plenty of potential collaborators here, most of the middle and upper classes were suggesting that we opened ‘negotiations’ with Hitler at that time. After all, he was seen by the moneyied as a bulwark against that nice Mr Stalin, and a workers paradise.
The collective hindsight that many demonstrated is a wonderful thing.

Not only gave up early but then had the nerve – as the Vichy French, to fight in large numbers for the Germans – the former enemy – and against the Allies – the British especially and the Yanks.

My impression is that the French never forgave the British for carrying on the fight after they had been conquered.

Paul.

I had occasion to look at the part played by one particular Frenchman during the last war. What he did was far from uncommon, sometimes it just suits us to think it was.

http://forum.keypublishing.com/showthread.php?91989-Looking-for-information-concerning-Sergent-Chef-BIAGGI&highlight=biaggi

Dominique was clearly a brave man, one who served his Country well and paid the ultimate price. In 1946, Dominique’s body was repatriated to his home town of Marseilles. His body was one of 125,000 Frenchmen repatriated to France between 1946 and 1948. Seems an awful lot for a Country which, after all, gave up after a few brief weeks in the late spring and early summer of 1940.

Regards,

kev35

As have I, Andy, and resent this typically English anti-French garbage usually seen in the tabloid pages. They are as much a mixed bag of humanity as the British but with many times the belief and commitment to the core of any society – the family.

As an ex para I will say what I have thought about the French. “cheese eating surrender monkeys!”

Obviously you don’t know any French people or their history.
I used to know a guy who was in the resistance, he ended up in a little place called Dachau.
I don’t suppose he’d give a monkey’s f**k about your opinion though.
I could also rumble on about Verdun, Artois, Notre Dame de Lorrette, Gallipoli, oh and slightly later Bir Hakeim and a load of other places–but it would be a complete waste of time–like casting pearls before swine.

I’ve spent a lot of time amongst the French, it’s better than here.
It’s not perfect by any means, but this country is dead–full of f*ckwits, wannabe’s and hangers on, the indolent, people who think the Daily Mail is real, and people who can’t cook, or wipe their own ar*e most likely.

Andy

Well, I signed the petition.You MAY well be able to change the future, but you will NEVER change History, or those who fought and died on those beaches and elsewhere.will certainly never be forgotten.I think the French have a bloo*y cheek to even suggest this.
Jim.
Lincoln .7

As an ex para I will say what I have thought about the French. “cheese eating surrender monkeys!”

I don’t give a stuff if people are annoyed. Read the history of Pegasus Bridge first!