Americans find ways to punish the French

The Daily Telegraph ^ | April 25, 2003 | Toby Harnden

[maro]

Why put a murderer's head on a pike? "Pour encourager les autres."

[<1/1,000,000th%]

Good post!

[Valin]

Condoleezza Rice, Mr Bush's national security adviser, is said to have come up with a slogan for how to break up the pre-war "non-nein-nyet" alliance against America over Iraq: punish France, ignore Germany and forgive Russia.

Ignore who?

[Grampa Dave]

Damn, you are a really fast learner.

I would say ignore them and don't buy any German cars, suvs, crystal, knives or optics for a few years. Then we will know you have learned all ready! Who? :)

[Grampa Dave]

Damn, you are a really fast learner.

I would say ignore them and don't buy any German cars, suvs, crystal, knives or optics for a few years. Then we will know you have learned all ready! Who? :)

[capitan_refugio]

Ivan, I think you would agree with me:

Shun the French!

[capitan_refugio]

If the Russians can ever shed themselves of the lingering shackles of communism, and adopt western-style republican democracy, watch out. They have the natural resources and the technological know-how to once again become an economic super-power.

What the Russians, as a whole, do not have in an entreprenuerial ethic. The American work ethic was born of our experience in exploring and taming the North American continent. We have traditionally been individualists. We have traditionally been a people who have admired the small businessman and the self-sufficient. (Admittedly, the socialist tendencies of the liberals have begun to sap the life's blood out of us, but the ethic of individual achievement remains.)

The Russians have a legacy of nearly 80 years of communism. Many Russians know nothing but the dole. But that may be changing before our eyes. They are developing a more friendly business climate and a burgeoning middle class. If it does change significantly, Russia can regain it's superpower status. On the other hand, the political left's socialist desires in this country may soon send up down the path of European socialism. Only time will tell.

[redrock]

There is NO need to punish the French.

They ARE, after all,FRENCH...which is punishment enough.

redrock

[capitan_refugio]

Because of traditional Swiss neutrality, they would not have allowed American ground convoys to travel in their territory either. They didn't allow the Americans, French, British, Italians, or Germans in WWII to travel on or over their land. This is nothing new.

[optik_b]

"France should be counting their blessings that the US isnt invading France. US would take Paris within a week, tops. "

France has nuclear weapons, so we'd have to take those out first.

[optik_b]

And we should continue the grass roots boycott of France.
There were mentions in some articles that it is starting to hurt them. Good!

I'm afraid its not really hurting them much. French owned Nissan is having a great year for sales amidst an auto industry slowdown and French based Airbus just took a huge order for Planes from JetBlue.

[optik_b]

And SkyBlue is punishing France by giving them a $4 billion dollar deal.

Do you mean the JetBlue order of $6.4 billion Airbus planes?

[FairOpinion]

"JETBLUE PLACES ORDER FOR 65 AIRBUS"

I noticed that. Unfortunately Airbus is a joint venture between France, Germany, UK, so we can't punish France, without also punishing the UK.

"Based in Toulouse, France, Airbus is an EADS joint Company with BAE SYSTEMS, incorporated under French law as a simplified joint stock company or “S.A.S.” (Société par Actions Simplifiée). It employs directly some 46,000 people of over 50 nationalities. Airbus’ design and production sites are grouped into four wholly-owned subsidiaries, Airbus France, Airbus Deutschland, Airbus España and Airbus UK."

http://www.airbus.com/about/organisation.asp

As for Nissan, I guess people don't know it's French.

But I read a couple of articles that French businesses were complaining about business fall off, as a result of the boycott, and they were surprised, they didn't think it would really matter.

[CWOJackson]

Oops, my bad. Allow me to extend my finger higher in their direction.

[jwh_Denver]

France has nuclear weapons, so we'd have to take those out first.

Some troop of Cub scouts could do that.

[MadIvan]

I think you mean "JetBlue".

Regards, Ivan

[Movemout]

"hmmm, I don't know what to say about the Swiss. Gonna have to brush up on thier issues with no fly zone for us. "

It's a red herring. The Swiss have been a neutral country as a matter of official government policy forever.

[Movemout]

"Condoleezza Rice, Mr Bush's national security adviser, is said to have come up with a slogan for how to break up the pre-war "non-nein-nyet" alliance against America over Iraq: punish France, ignore Germany and forgive Russia. "

IMHO this is quite brilliant. France bears the brunt of the pain. Germany doesn't want to end up in the same category as France and, as yet unformed Russia is still in whatever future game we want them to play

[katana]

Not to throw cold water, but the tried and true saying from the time of the USSR and the DDR was that no one has ever invented a system that the Germans could not make work, and no one has invented one that the Russians could make work.

The Russian people have a very rough and unlucky history, but if there's any group that deserves a break it's them. Everybody I've met who has visited Russia and gotten to know them as people like them and wish them well. For me, given the choice of spending a weekend with a group of Russians, Germans, Frenchmen, Japanese, or Chinese, the Russians would be the first choice every time.