Americans turn fire on ungrateful nation

The Times ^ | March 14, 2003 | Roland Watson, Richard Beeston, Philip Webster and Elaine Monaghan

[MadIvan]

AMERICAN hostility to France reached new heights yesterday when the remains of US servicemen buried in Normandy were dragged into the heat of battle over Iraq.

A Florida congresswoman introduced a Bill on Capitol Hill that would allow the families of Second World War dead to dig up their bones and take them home.

Ginny Brown-Waite said that her American Heroes Repatriation Act 2003 was a response to constituents’ concerns that their fathers and grandfathers were lying in “unpatriotic soil”. She said: “The French don’t seem to remember that if it wasn’t for America, they would be speaking German.”

Her melodramatic flourish was the most far-reaching effort yet to codify American anger at what politicians and the public see as a mixture of French ingratitude, arrogance and wilful obstruction of US foreign policy interests.

Deep irritation is also running rife in Whitehall, where Britain’s relations with France have been plunged into the diplomatic freezer. It emerged yesterday that ministerial contacts between London and Paris have all but ceased because of the dispute over Iraq.

Foreign Office officials disclosed that Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, had dozens of telephone conversations with counterparts around the world over the past week. He logged 21 calls to Colin Powell, his US counterpart. But he has not spoken to Dominique de Villepin, the French Foreign Minister, since the two men argued publicly across the floor of the United Nations Security Council last Friday.

In Downing Street, Mr Blair’s spokesman accused France of poisoning the diplomatic well: “I don’t think that anyone is under any illusion that if you inject into the diplomatic bloodstream a strategic, in-principle veto, then that’s going to poison the system and present very real difficulties.”

Cabinet ministers also vented thinly veiled frustration. Gordon Brown, the Chancellor, said the threat of a French veto, come what may, represented an “unreasonable blockage”. Such a label is designed to pave the way for the US and Britain to argue that they have moral authority, should they win nine or ten votes for a second resolution, to override a French veto.

Mr Straw said that France had made a peaceful outcome more difficult to achieve. He said it was extraordinary that France was not prepared to give “proper consideration” to Britain’s proposals.

Animosity towards Paris is greater at street level in the US than in Britain. The sentiment has seen French fries renamed freedom fries and ad hoc boycotts of French wine and cheese across the country.

The denunciation of the French as “cheese-eating surrender monkeys”, first levelled by a character in the televised cartoon The Simpsons, has entered the public lexicon, emerging on more than 6,000 websites.

Politicians have resorted to caricature when seeking to undermine the French position. “The French remind me a little bit of an ageing actress of the 1940s who was still trying to dine out on her looks but doesn’t have the face for it,” John McCain, the Republican senator and former presidential hopeful, said.

Richard Perle, chairman of the Pentagon’s Defence Policy Board and Washington’s unofficial leading hawk, said France had betrayed America. “The French are given to the folie de grandeur always. With Chirac it has reached new heights,” he told The Times.

The sentiment is shared by many in the White House, although expressed in more diplomatic language. Ari Fleischer, President Bush’s spokesman, reflecting yesterday that France had promised to veto Britain’s latest proposals even before Iraq had objected to them, said: “This is not the way to disarm Saddam Hussein. This is not the way to have a peaceful outcome.”

The London-Paris row is likely to dominate the European Council meeting in Brussels on Thursday, when Mr Blair and President Chirac will meet.

[VOA]

AMERICAN hostility to France reached new heights yesterday when the remains of
US servicemen buried in Normandy were dragged into the heat of battle over Iraq.

Actually, this does sort of emotive outburst is understandable.
I have watched in amazement as Colin Powell has evolved from "Mr. Sensitive Diplomat"
last year, "Mr. Happy Diplomat" after that 15-0 vote for Resolution 1441, then
to "Mr. Please Honor Our Agreement Diplomat" when France starts their "Non!" chorus,
and now he's finally (according to knowledgeable sources) "Mr. NO MORE MR. NICE GUY Diplomat".

When a country ticks off even Colin Powell like this...they've gone too freakin' far.

[CrimeOf73]

free to agree with us and not much else.

In fact, France is free to disagree with us, as evidenced by the fact that they are doing so most vociferously.

[Brian Allen]

<< Jack Straw .... has not spoken to Dominique de Villepin, the French Foreign Minister, since the two men argued publicly across the floor [At the un's cave full of thugs in New York] last Friday. >>

Things are really tough for EUROpe's slutstate when the loathesome moral relativist, Straw, feels free to slag its Soddom-promoting foreign-policy barker and shill.


<< I know ... once great Britain .... can count on US. >>

Got that bit right. Since it stopped sending its mercenaries to plunder and murder Americans it always has!

[Michael.SF.]

A Florida congresswoman introduced a Bill on Capitol Hill that would allow the families of Second World War dead to dig up their bones and take them home.

Why stop there? Since the French are such ingrates, lets pack up other historical items and send them back to where they came from:

Statue of Liberty in Paris 1886 w/ Bartholdi in Foreground

Let's wait until this thing is over before we do anything foolish. The Congresswoman's Bill seems to me to be a bit over dramatic.

And NO I am not defending their actions. I am just saying the French Government does not represent the true feelings of all the French people, just as Clinton did not reflect the true spirt of all Americans.

[Jim Noble]

France has been more afraid of Iraq than of America and Britain.

Bad, bad mistake.

[cinFLA]

"The denunciation of the French as “cheese-eating surrender monkeys”, "

bump

[Dr. Frank fan]

someone needs to teach the french that liberate means they are free to agree with us and not much else.

No, they are free to "disagree" with us all they want.

That's not what they're doing. They are actively trying to prevent us from defending our nation.

Not the same thing.

[L,TOWM]

You that it is'nt it. To my mind, disagreeing with us should be in private. You don't want to draw down on the ragheads, cool. You need to keep your own Islamowackos from going beserk, fine, tell 'em your sitting out on this one, and will work for "postwar justice". You don't like our "cowboy foreign policy, alright, your guy talks to our guy over lunch. Think its gonna cost you $$$$, fine, Uncle Sugar's got your back.

Dont't publicly tell everyone that we are wrong.
Don't actively lobby for votes against us from the rest of the world.
Don't put up road blocks.
Don't drip cheese stinking urine on our backs and tell us its rain.

That's the kind of $#!+ the f'ing commies did to us in the 70's, this is'nt how people should act that still owe us a big bill for WWII, AND keepin' the damm Russkis off of 'em for 45 years. We're FAMILY dammit!! The most succesful family that the world has ever seen; the family of Western Civillization. And now these traitorous scum are siding with the kid down the street that keeps spray painting people's houses, and keeps looking at ours. 'F em. Time to throw their crap on the front lawn and change the locks.

/end rant

[skeeter]

someone needs to teach the french that liberate means they are free to agree with us and not much else.

Of course they can disagree. They are free to disagree without providing a reasonable explanation.

But they should expect us to get plenty pissed when their disagreement includes actively impeding us in a life or death matter without giving us a reasonable explanation for doing so.

[laz17]

[Robert_Paulson2]

you guys better keep up on where their two nuke subs are located....
my guess is one is off the coast of Dover and the other off the coast of Atlanta...

I think it is becoming that serious.
Britain still has hunter/killer subs? Sonar net?

France wants a war because they thinkthat with the secret alliance that has just been blown wide open... with China, Russia, Iran, Iraq, N. Korea, Cuba, Venezuela... and ahost of other third worlders, that they can take us on and wipe us out as a world power.

They have never loved the UK either. The USA is number one... THE UK is a close second... and Aussies are followed by Israel...
France is after us all. They have apparently fooled Turkey into their gaggle of whores...
Tony is right to cut off relations.
Forgive me but; "Damn the French..."

[glock rocks]

somewhere there's a jdam just itching to scratch the baghdad french embassy.

[spectre]

In your photo in post #1:

Is that a weasel in his pants? Or is he just happy to see you, Ivan? :>)

[edwin hubble]

Separated at Birth Chirac and Pesci

[Dr. Frank fan]

Actually the are only trying to prevent us from doing this with UN approval. which isn't that much prevention.

I hope you are right that lack of UN approval will not prevent war.

Notice how illegitimate and dishonest you're already conceding France as being, however. After all it's not as if France is honestly or sincerely trying to evaluate the issue of whether Iraq is in violation of Resolution 1441. It is, and France knows it. They just don't care, because their focus is on trying to prevent us from doing something we want to do with UN approval.

The fact is that UN "approval" should be near-automatic in this case, because Iraq is obviously in violation, and so I reject the idea that for France to "try to prevent us" can be considered any kind of sincere exercise on their part.

Anyway, if we do end up attacking without UN approval, and France doesn't whine shrilly and haughtily lecture us about "violating the international order", then maybe you'll have a point here. Let me know if/when that happens.

[edwin hubble]

html glitch

Separated at Birth:

Jacques Chirac and Joe Pesci

[MadIvan]

Well perhaps the photo was taken by Saddam. ;)

Regards, Ivan

[Robert_Paulson2]

I am expecting their two nuclear subs to have a "work accident" if this continues much longer...