? Has France really started every major war in the last 1000 years?

k_dawg and others, America did fight its Vietnam War, but this was a separate incident from the two wars involving France and the Vietnamese. These wars were separated by the invasion of Japan during WWII. France did not start the war for us and we didn't go into 'Nam to save the French. AND depending on the outlook of the situation, the French did not start the war. The war started as a result of an uprising in French Colonial Vietnam by the Vietnamese who wished to overthrow the French for control of their own territories.
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Ho Chi Minh (translates to something like "Grand Old Vietnamese Man" and is not too far distant from "Mahatma", the name given to Mohandas K. Ghandi) approached American diplomatic contacts in China during WWII and asked for American support following the expected defeat of the Japanese. HCM was a "small c" communist like Josip Broz Tito and sought to ally with the west. He was turned down.

Following VJ Day, America blocked Britain's return to her colonies but supported France's return to Indochine. We supported and financed French combat forces in Indochine and had some of our own "advisors" on site with a limited number of air resources.

Following Dien Bien Phu and the withdrawal of the French, we supported the South Vietnamese but were forced to continually escalate the support and provision of advisers. We know where it went from there.

We may have had an opportunity to bring Indochine and HCM to the table but we backed the French.
 
Hal, the Crusades were officially the result of the call to arms by Pope Urban II in 1095. Granted, his call was made in France, but the Crusades involved knights from across much of Europe. The French were most definitely involved, but the Crusades were NOT started by France.
 
but offered ZERO proof.
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First light up a little. You're right , I offered "zero" (no need to shout) *proof*.
I don't honestly feel I have to *prove* anything. Please remember, I asked a question.- the ? in the title of the thread.

Second - thank you for taking the time and trouble to post the list and the dates.

So Hal, just what major wars do you and your friend think that France started?
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00, I explained that already. The friend of mine that made that comment isn't around to ask him exactly which ones he feels France started. All I said was the he may have a valid point. I didn't agree or disagree - mainly because I don't know - - which is why I asked for comments.

What do you have to offer?
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Well - speaking of the Treaty of Versailles.

""Here, 11 November 1918, succumbed the criminal pride of the German Empire. Vanquished by the free peoples it sought to enslave."

That's inscription on the stone slab in the "The Glade of the Armistice" in the Forest of Compiegne. The armistice was signed inside of a railroad car. (note the term criminal - that was a major sore point in the treaty for the Germans. They felt the term "criminal" layed the entire blame for starting the war on Germany)

22 years later,(june 1940) the same railroad car was removed from the museum where it had been placed, and taken to the exact spot in Compiegne. The Germans dictated the terms of the armistice there as they accepted the French surrender. The place was chosen ,,because in Hitler's own words:
""to efface once and for all by an act of reparative justice a memory which was resented by the German people as the greatest shame of all time."

Granted that isn't proof positive or a smoking gun. It does show that it really stuck in the German craw though. Germany rolled over quite a few places early on in WWII and I don't recall off the top of my head any other place they humiliated someone quite that bad. Butched yes - but not humiliated.
 
Might consider part of the French 'attitude', especially during the ww-2 era, and some of the postwar period... is due to ww-1 events like the Marne and Verdun. Not exactly a group of cowards who still kept going into situations like the Verdun morass...some knowing that the commanders were in over their heads.
Nothing in US history...even Shiloh, Gettysburg, Cold Harbor, D-Day or Gaudalcanal, really has the same context.
Mayhaps with the French, losing millions of their braver men, and much lesser men...over the period of four years, took them in another direction from us.
Look what it did to the Russians and the Germans.
 
America did fight its Vietnam War, but this was a separate incident from the two wars involving France and the Vietnamese. These wars were separated by the invasion of Japan during WWII. France did not start the war for us and we didn't go into 'Nam to save the French.
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Did you not read my post? The French link in Vietnam is direct, contiguous, and after WWII.
 
Hal, just because the same railroad car was used does not justify any sort of notion that France started WWII. The topic as per your post concerns France starting wars, all the major wars of the last 1000 years. Yes, Germany's point of surrender did stick in their craw and they used that against the French, but so what? What does it have to do with the starting of the war? You can't blame France for starting the war just because the folks in Germany had a bruised ego over their previous defeat.

Destructo6, I did read your post. The link is direct, but the cause of the start is not just as the link between France and Germany is direct for WWII, but there is no link to France starting WWII either.

So Hal, can you come up with any wars that France actually started? I have already noted one. If so, then share with us the cause or start of the war. The thread is YOUR premise, so how about you actually coming up with some justifications for France starting major wars. No doubt there are some. I have already shown that they certainly didn't start all of them, now you show the ones they did.
 
Hal, I will even help you out to get you started. Here is a nice list of military conflicts for France and their outcomes. All you have to do is figure out the starting causes. The interpretations are a little tongue and cheek...

http://brendoman.com/honzo/old site/france/
Gallic Wars - Lost. In a war whose ending foreshadows the next 2000 years of French history, France is conquered by of all things, an Italian.

Hundred Years War - Mostly lost, saved at last by female schizophrenic who inadvertently creates The First Rule of French Warfare; "France's armies are victorious only when not led by a Frenchman."

Italian Wars - Lost. France becomes the first and only country to ever lose two wars when fighting Italians.

Wars of Religion - France goes 0-5-4 against the Huguenots.

Thirty Years War - France is technically not a participant, but manages to get invaded anyway. Claims a tie on the basis that eventually the other participants started ignoring her.

War of Devolution - Tied. Frenchmen take to wearing red flowerpots as chapeaux.

The Dutch War - Tied.

War of the Augsburg League/King William's War/French and Indian War -Lost, but claimed as a tie. Three ties in a row induces deluded Frogophiles the world over to label the period as the height of French military power.

War of the Spanish Succession - Lost. The War also gave the French their first taste of a Marlborough, which they have loved ever since.

American Revolution - In a move that will become quite familiar to future Americans, France claims a win even though the English colonists saw far more action. This is later known as "de Gaulle Syndrome", and leads to the Second Rule of French Warfare; "France only wins when America does most of the fighting."

French Revolution - Won, primarily due the fact that the opponent was also French.

The Napoleonic Wars - Lost. Temporary victories (remember the First Rule!) due to leadership of a Corsican, who ended up being no match for a British footwear designer.

The Franco-Prussian War - Lost. Germany first plays the role of drunk Frat boy to France's ugly girl home alone on a Saturday night.

World War I - Tied and on the way to losing, France is saved by the United States. Thousands of French women find out what it's like to not only sleep with a winner, but one who doesn't call her "Fraulein." Sadly, widespread use of condoms by American forces forestalls any improvement in the French bloodline.

World War II - Lost. Conquered French liberated by the United States and Britain just as they finish learning the Horst Wessel Song.

War in Indochina - Lost. French forces plead sickness, take to bed with the Dien Bien Flu. Algerian Rebellion - Lost. Loss marks the first defeat of a western army by a Non-Turkic Muslim force since the Crusades, and produces the First Rule of Muslim Warfare; "We can always beat the French." This rule is identical to the First Rules of the Italians, Russians, Germans, English, Dutch, Spanish, Vietnamese and Esquimaux.

War on Terrorism - France, keeping in mind its recent history, surrenders to Germans and Muslims just to be safe. Attempts to surrender to Vietnamese ambassador fail after he takes refuge in a McDonald's.
 
00

You left out the Cola Wars - France surrendered to Pepsi :D


Anyhow - seriously. Germany had more than just a bruised ego.

Gallic wars - Very tough to pinpoint since it's tough to nail down just what was France, and what wasn't France. As near as I can tell, France became France (as we can call it) with Charles the Bald - (grandson of Charlemagne )taking control of Western Gaul.
 
Hal, actually, I thought France had gone with Tab, not Pepsi.

Stop debating in the French manner and make a committed stand. You can call Germany's ego anything you want, but that still won't change the fact that France didn't start WWII. Heck, I will even help you here as well. Hitler ordered the train car to be taken intact. It was a calculated bit of symbolism to demoralize the French by making them surrender to Germany in the same car in which Germany surrendered. So sure, it goes beyond ego and was definite strategy that went far in endearing the French to the Germans.

I don't think I can give you much more help. I have provided you with the cannons and shells, but you have to find the targets and fire on them. I'll give you a hint, there aren't many (major wars France actually started).
 
The problem and the point is, is that events tend to have gross and subtle implications that have effects way beyond the time of their occurrence. French attitudes, even into the 1960's, were in part formed by events like Verdun. The US, excepting in it's two intercine wars (the Civil war and the invasions of Indian country),
has not been put into a position of having a equivalent major loss, on it's home ground.(And as nasty as the intercine US wars were, these events were of a considerably different nature than Verdun...ww-1 was when modern technology finally trapped its makers). And the two populations subjected to substantial loss in the US (the NA's and the South) still have the effects very much part of their persona. And that series of events goes back 100, 200 and more years.
As for France starting wars, a few along the way. But usually, France being a resource rich country with large populations, makes it a popular target for attack. That's one of the reasons the English, for several centuries, kept raiding France...plus seemingly returning the favor for the Norman(Viking+French) invasions. The other, although early French armies were large and well equipped (at times), these also tended to be very removed from their people-and so not as effective as some other powers, like Britain. But look what the French did in the Napoleonic era, where at least for a while it was a 'national army'. Could even argue that French idiocies in the colonial era, were a long lingering wish to take back the glories of the empire.
Unfortunately (or fortunately depending on what it does to your country), long past events do have a way of wafting up to cause current attitudes. Somewhere, right now in Iraq, somebody's probably recounting what happened at the horns of Hattin, and as a indirect result some US soldier, will be a casualty tommorow.
So whether it's Paris, Baghdad, Atlanta, or Pine Ridge...we do tend to get enmeshed in the threads left from the long ago.
 
I see, another vote for disembodied France starting all the major wars?

Yes, the French may has made people made over the centuries and such things can have long term impacts, but hardly constitute cause and effect in regard to starting wars.

Ah, another veiled French start? The Napoleonic Wars are pretty good guess, second in ease to the French Revolution.
 
"k_dawg, how do you figure? What was it about French imperialism in Vietnam that caused the US to go to war with Vietnam?"

"We didn't go into Vietnam to save the French."

No, but we did do just about everything else.

After World War II, the French military effort in Indochina was almost completely footed -- both money AND military supplies -- by the United States.

Why?

Because it was the French who were fighting the Vietmihn communists, and that served our purpose very nicely.

When France withdrew, the nation was partitioned at the 17th parallel by international accord.

The United States began it's program of intervention in Indochina in 1950 with the first American advisors, who worked with the French. During subsequent presidencies, the number of advisors and military aid was continuously increased.
 
France and the Crusades...

The first Crusade was called by Pope Urban II at the Council of Clermont. He was one of the Avingon (sp?) (French) popes -- a pope of French blood, headquartered in France (not Rome), and essentially picked by the French king.
 
No, not a vote for France starting 'all the wars'.
The idea is that cause and effect is more related to the subtle changes in attitude resulting from past events.
The idea was to get away from the concept of the French being cowards and all the other attendant cliches. The ossaries at Verdun pretty well negate that contention.
Every society has its defining moments which seem to set group attitudes...
That's why, for example, the French still do schoolkid tours to the ossaries at Verdun. The Russians do the same, for the Stalingrad battlefield. So when the US, starts boosting for war...the French have a few hundred thousand skulls lined up at ossaries, which tends to shift their attitudes about the whole thing. And being occupied in ww-2, had another effect. (Incidentally...Deconstructivism (Foucalt) is a big philosophy in American Universities...but much of its canon, could be attributed as a result of ww-2 on the French pysche).
The US, our defining recent period seemed to have been ww-2, and our civil war. And compared to what happened to other countries in those contexts, we came out fairly well. So threads like this one...where there are implications of cowardice or conspiracy...seem to be lacking in more than a small amount of basic historical knowledge.
And in the influence of historical events there do tend to be some interesting- albeit subtle cause and effect in starting wars...or making them worse...for example Bush's recent reference to crusades...raises considerably different meanings in an Islamic country.
 
France did NOT, by any stretch of the imagination, start either World War I OR World War II.

Sorry, folks, Germany started both of them.

For suggested reading on the lead in to World War I, read the Guns of August, by Barbara Tuchman.

As for World War II, Germany started that little affair by invading Poland in its desire for land (leibsraum).

France and Britain had a military and economic alliance with Poland.

When Germany invaded, both France and Britain sent demands that German troops be withdrawn. Germany ignored the ultimatiums, and consequently PM Nevill Chamberlain addressed the British:

"I am speaking to you from the Cabinet Room at 10 Downing Street.
This morning the British Ambassador in Berlin handed the German Government a final note stating that, unless we hear from them by 11 o'clock that they were prepared at once to withdraw their troops from Poland, a state of war would exist between us. I have to tell you now that no such undertaking has been received, and that consequently this country is at war with Germany."


Interestingly enough, the British declaration of war came 5 hours BEFORE the French declaration of war.
 
Sorry, folks, Germany started both of them.
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Well, certainly not the first one, Mike.

The Austro-Hungarian Empire was in a stare down with Serbia but Serbia was backed up by the Russia. France was allied with Russia (was that the Dual Entente?) and they were so eager to mobilize and go to war that they fell all over themselves rushing troops east. French troops have always shown great courage before battle. There have been many cases, however, where they exhibited less courage once the battle was struck.

The Germans were allies of the Austro-Hungarians (where was Admiral Horthy while this was happening?) but they appear to have underestimated the scale of the crisis and were the last to mobilize troops.

I don't think we can pin this on the Germans but I do know that an appeaser named Neville Chamberlain allowed the Second World War to take place.
 
Yes, it's true. ;) And seemingly the United States has bailed them out of each one.

Their M.O. is always the same:

1. Talk big.
2. Get attacked.
3. Promptly surrender.
4. The United States saves them.
5. In return, we only ask for enough ground to bury our dead.
6. The French turn on us.

Someday, we'll become more wise and eliminate #4......
 
France did NOT, by any stretch of the imagination, start either World War I OR World War II.
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The "any stretch" part makes the statement invalid. One could stretch that the terms of Germany's surrender in WW I, harsh by any measure, resulted in the conditions under which WW II was inevitable. Also, while it's historically correct to state that WW II officially started on September 3, 1939, I'd argue that WW II had unofficially started long before.

Students of our history in the 1930's will find eerie similarities in the events of those days and many of today's headlines. History does indeed repeat itself.
 
? Has France really started every major war in the last 1000 years?
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No.

Hal, how does your friend attribute to the French:

The Mexican-American War?

The Russian-Japanese war a hundred years ago?

The conflict between Pakistan and India?

The numerous conflicts in South America over the last millenium?

The Opium Wars (Anglo-Chinese wars in 1830s)?

The Spanish conquest of the Aztecs, Mayans, and Incans?

The Ottoman-Russian War?


The claim is actually kind of silly.
 
If anything, it is the British who are responsible for many of the above wars. Pakistan probably wouldn't have become a country were it not for the British empire's control of India in the 19th and 20th centuries. The Opium Wars are an obvious influence of the British. Chamberlain allowed Hitler to gain enough momentum for WW II to take place.
 
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