You know what the french say : we love to hate americans. Its a love hate kind of relationship.
Maybe its because we are so similar at a deep level.
And for the record, were it not for french troups, you would still be a british colony. But I suppose the first thing you americans learn in school is that you gained the independence all by yourselves. :rotfl2:

Generally, yes, that is what is taught in US schools, at least superficially. And as you said, the truth is, shall we say, far more complicated.

And don't forget Cuba/Spain. They also helped us in the revolutionary war.

We had a lotta help. :yep:

I'm not I just like to keep my mind open. In the past I had fallen to severe deception. I've learned that most people would lie easily without guilt given pressure or not. As a foreigner I'm concerned about US reduced capability, perceived or real, to project power which would mean potential instability anywhere in the world including Asia. And the war in Iraq and Afghanistan have certainly contributed to that and the demise of the economy by putting strain on the budget which has the direct consequence to weaken US ability and willingness to project power in the near future especially ground war.

I think de Gaulle was predicting that the US would make many (if not all) of the same mistakes that great empires tend to make. And he was right. :yep:

I recall in school the French mentioned in our American History class when discussing the Revolution. :up:

My teacher taught us to be thankful for the French supplied cutlery we used to gut Red Coats, and the one Prussian who showed us how to use them. ;)

Aside from what's already been said, I wonder how many of my countrymen realize that the Statue of Liberty, is from France.


Also have to add, you know the hatred of the French is all fine and dandy... but its gotten a bit old. We, the current generations of Americans, did not save France from anybody. They don't owe us a damn thing. How much longer are we going to ride on the coattails of our forebears trying to bask in something that our generations had nothing to do with?

That's an interesting statement, interesting because I concur and disagree at the same time. Conflicting... :haha:

I agree because the usual putdown from the US to anyone in Europe is "We won the war" or in particularly to the Allies "You would not have won the war without us." Of course this is equally right or wrong depending upon your view, the war would have ended, yes, but the whole of Europe would be in the Comintern. Some more right leaning people might argue it's there anyway, but I digress.
I disagree with you because there are still generations today, on this forum, who stood at the Fulda Gap and prevented the Soviet Union from doing something stupid, jsut as there were Soviets on the other side preventing us from being overconfident. Balance of power, something that has pretty much no meaning now the Cold war is over. Those people, who may have considered themselves in the arse end of the cold war, did a lot for the people of West Berlin who could have been shut down by the Soviets any time they wanted but for fear of military retaliation.
Post Cold War though, aside from KFOR, the US has remained out of European conflicts, primarily because at the moment there are none. If the time comes again and we do go into another conflict in Europe, will the US get involved again? Probably, yes, but like the Second World War and First World War, it will probably need a bit of spurring on to do so.

On the original topic at hand, it's a tricky one to rule on. The US is designed to fight a ground war, however it's not designed to fight one outside of Europe because with the exception of the Pacific theatre, that's where most of Americas most successful wars have been, and the United States forces spent sixty years preparing for war in the Fulda gap. The same could well be said for the British Armed Forces, although we had some previous experiences of the Middle East since we owned several parts of it once, and in hindsight really should not have let them go... :haha: It's a new era of warfare and we're only just beginning to adapt to it, which doubtless means that when the next era of warfare arrives (be it with China or whoever) we'll be caught off guard and need to adapt to that drumbeat.