France Still Steamed about U.S. Victory

Scripps Howard News Service ^ | 30-DEC-03 | Dale McFeatters

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

A European journalist, a Belgian working for a French newspaper, has written a book documenting the obvious _ that French coverage of the Iraq war was wildly biased against the United States.

French newspapers' coverage reflected the French public's _ and, one suspects, the government's _ gleeful hope that the United States, if not actually defeated, would at least suffer a humiliating setback.

"As soon as there were a couple of wounded, of dead, they were talking about Vietnam, Stalingrad," Alain Hertoghe told the Associated Press. French journalists, he said, "dreamed of an American defeat."

Instead, the war was over in three weeks flat, and Hertoghe says that French readers still can't understand why.

For his critical analysis of the coverage, Hertoghe was fired by his newspaper, La Croix, and his book, "La Guerre a Outrances" ("The War of Outrages"), was ostracized by the French press. The AP says that only a small paper given away on the Paris subway has reviewed it. "The silence is deafening," says his publisher.

What Hertoghe needs is a respected international news organization to take up his cause in the spirit of free inquiry and the dissemination of critical information. How about it, BBC?

(Contact Dale McFeatters at McFeattersD(at)SHNS.com. Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, http://www.shns.com)

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

France, the U.N., and their skiffy EU can go shove it.

[KantianBurke]

Not all of France is weasel-like. Like in this country, its elites, from whom most of us get our impressions from, are loony lefties.

[ffusco]

True enough. Most of the french elite are Parisians. OTOH It is good to hate the french as they have been unscrupulous for a couple of milenium.

[KarlInOhio]

Take the article, cross out "France" or "French" and replace it with "New York Times" and it would be just as true.

[Fzob]

"As soon as there were a couple of wounded, of dead, they were talking about Vietnam, Stalingrad," Alain Hertoghe told the Associated Press. French journalists, he said, "dreamed of an American defeat."

And this is different than most of the American press in what way? Granted, they waited until it was over, but since then is there much of a difference?

[Johnny_Cipher]

As my neighbor's 15 year old delights in saying, "S*cks to be you."

Q: How do you know when you've got a genuine French flag?
A: The red and blue stripes are attached with Velcro.

[expatpat]

How about it, BBC?

LOL

[HardStarboard]

>>>Granted, they waited until it was over<<<

Hardly! The US media was crying "quagmire" just a week into the war when the sandstorm bogged us down - after an advance to withing 40 miles of Baghdad.

[CWOJackson]

"France Still Steamed about U.S. Victory"

Which one, Iraq or D-Day?

[marlon]

I'm still going to boycott French products for as long as I can. Never, never going to buy a French wine. Too many good Italian, Californian, Australian, Spainish wines to give the cheese eating surrender monkeys one % of my golld old greenback.

[COBOL2Java]

Which one, Iraq or D-Day?

American Revolution, and every one since then...

[Hugin]

But French opinion polls showed overwhelming public support for Chirac's opposition to Bush. You can't just explain that away as the "elite". Of course there some who support us, but they are a small minority.

[KantianBurke]

Al Bundy is that you? :>

[KantianBurke]

True. Then again do they get Foxnews or have a French version of FR? Reminds me of the book "Bias." Newsrooms think as they do because there isn't any other viewpoints present. Might it be the case with them?

[ffusco]

Ummm, No Peg!

[samtheman]

Instead, the war was over in three weeks flat, and Hertoghe says that French readers still can't understand why.

The concept of military victory cannot be translated into the French language.

[raisincane]

My friend's brother has lived in France for many years. He argues with her saying our government lies to us constantly.
He tells her the rest of the world hears the truth and USA never gets the real story. Our government censors the news. HA!

[notpoliticallycorewrecked]

Instead, the war was over in three weeks flat, and Hertoghe says that French readers still can't understand why.

That's because they don't know what it is like to win. They don't know how to win, because they have never planned to win. They wouldn't know a victory opportunity if in bit them in the butt.

[the_Watchman]

I spend a lot of time in Europe and work for a French company. I have heard the "Americans do not get the truth" for many years.

In a small way, they are right. U.S. press is focused on the U.S. We do NOT get a good dose of what goes on in the rest of the world. We really need to get more world news. Many of us on Free Republic hear much more about the rest of the world than Americans who read the newspaper.

The European press covers much more of what occurs in Europe and what occurs in predominantly former European colonies. Granted, with the relatively small size of Europe, general European news is roughly equivalent to news from different U.S. states. However, that observation does not keep them from thumbing their noses at us.

This complaint is generally heard from people who believe that people like Ronald Reagan were uninformed about the nature of the Soviet Union. I had a Swede SCREAMING at me that I "just didn't get it!" as he contended that the whole rest of the world was against the U.S. invasion of Iraq.