France will never forget

Unfortunately, the media forgot to report it.

http://www.consulfrance-atlanta.org/article.php3?id_article=1126

Shenengians from cheese eating commie surrender monkeys

It was pay for the navy they lent us during the American revolution. Don't worry though, France, keep the change. We got plenty more where that came from.

They'll never forget, until we ask for something important, then they'll look the other way and whistle like they don't hear us.

French assistance against the British was based on self-interest.
Ditto American assistance against the Nazi's.

Sounds as if you still haven't forgiven France for knowing your "intelligence" was bad and saying so. Damn them for their continuous attempts to help!

The current situation only shows how right they were.

So's everything everyone does.

Absolute bullshit. A bypasser that risks his life to try to save a drowning child isn't motivated by self-interest. It may be rare that it happens, but there are actions done for the sheer sake of altruism - because it's the right thing to do.

As far as the liberation of Europe goes, tens of thousands of men died to give them the right of self-rule back - that in their own weakness, they lost. It was in America's self-interest to see the Nazi's defeated, but quite frankly it was America altruism that caused them to restore the status quo to what it was before.

Not really what it was before; arguably something much better in many ways.

But what would you see the US do with (Western) Europe after WW2 if motivated by self-interest more than by altruism?

Well, the first thing to come to mind is Patton's desire to use the former Nazis in a war with the Soviets....

But it would have been exceptionally easy to keep the conquered territories as military governorships indefinitely, especially with the rise of the Iron Curtain. The money that went into rebuilding infrastructure and restarting the Western economies could have been used to make a permanent military buffer zone.

The return of the Western democracies of course did that as well, and perhaps better, because it was of course in their self-interest to avoid domination by the Soviets, and free people are more motivated - especially in the next generation that remembered the Nazis.

But the US could have exerted far more direct control than it did.

And, of course, if all the US was really worried about was it's own self-defense, there was no way the Nazis were going to cross the Atlantic against our Army Air Force and Navy. Even with the German declaration of war, we could have sat out of direct confrontation until the A-Bomb was ready.

I disagree. People act out of selflessness all the time.
However, states generally do not. Nobody should be pretending that America or France helped each other out of "altruism".

Yeah, whatever. Much as I appreciate the French for making this latest gesture, we all know that they were motivated against the Iraq conflict by two factors 1) Their economic interest in Iraq in the form of $20 Billion worth of weaponry and 2) The abject fear the had of us uncovering the kickbacks and bribes the French had gotten via the oil for food program.

Interesting how some people can see right through corrupt motives in others, but for the life of them refuse to see it from their own side.

If you'd care to actually debate Cass, I'd more than happy to eviscerate your meager intellect.

Again.

Considering you are the one that comments about how the US is the moral equivalent to the Third Reich in its current efforts, I'd love to hear you reasoning on why the US allowed Western Europe to return to their democratic roots. How exactly was it evil and selfish of the United States to give the countries back to their people?

Are you kidding? The US subverted just about every election in Europe following World War 2 to ensure the left was kept out of power.

Tell France they're welcome.

Both claims unsupported by any evidence whatsoever. France's claim clearly supported by the lack of WMDs. You will, as always, believe what you like.

Considering the Left was being actively funded and often took their working orders from the Soviet Union during this time, it was along the same lines as NATO - the US actively trying to protect the western democracies and willing to spend life and treasure to do so.

Or are you going to equate democracy with the process that was used in the Soviet Union - and every place they gained power.

Exactly.

Yes, but what would they gain from that?

It seems to me that is pre-modern thinking, one that sort of also influences some of the debates about ME policies. It is not necessarily advantageous to conquer, occupiy and imperially control foreign territory anymore. In fact, it often seems to be a major disadvantage.

Arguably so, provided you were sure at the time that your bomb would be ready first. We know NOW that the Third Reich was nowhere near developing nukes, but I seem to recall the US wasn't that sure at the time.

No, I'm just going to claim that both sides interfered with the elections - the Italian one in 1948 is a good example - both using less than democratic means. The CIA for example funded the Mafia (which Mussolini had all but destroyed) to break the Italian unions.

Politics, shmolitics, war, shmar.
They should thank us by washing more.
Especially their asses.

And CIA interference in Italian politics lasts into the 1970s, when the declassified record dries up...

Oh, I'm sure it went on longer than that.

The Italian Communist Party (PCI) was by far the largest recipient of financial assistance of any Communist party in any country. This lasted from the 40s to almost 1980, when their was finally a split between the two groups. Declassifed politboro records indicate that the Soviets funneled at least $60 million to the PCI, and some members were sent to East Germany and the Soviet Union to receive Stasi and KGB training in intelligence.

The PCI finally broke entirely with the Soviets in 1979 over the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. They had been drifted apart ideologically from their bankrollers since the formation of the Eurocommunism ideal, an attempt to make communism more relevant to Western democracies and less dependent on Soviet influence.

But a successful communist party supported directly by the Soviet Union in post-war Europe was definitely going to draw an anti-communist response from the US. The Italian communists were particularly successful, getting as much as 31% of the vote in the 1948 election - and later 34% in the 1976 election.

Of course, in 1948, it helped considerably that the Soviet backed anti-democratic coup in Czechloslovokia occured just two weeks before the Italian election.

Well, that's certainly the modern interpretation - and no doubt the truth in a modern world of telecommunications.

However, in 1945 the Soviets were proving that it was indeed possible to garrison and control European powers, given sufficient resources. They even put down rebellions, in Czechloslovokia and Hungary.

Of course, it was never the US intention to make a military colony out of Europe (though the irony would have been delicious, granted). From the very beginning of our entry into the war we supported the concept of freeing Europe, not implementing our own rule over them.

And it was just as much that the American people wouldn't stand for it, that the men who rushed out and joined the military when the Japanese attacked wouldn't have supported two generations of military occupation of Western europe. Our own ideals wouldn't have allowed for it.

Valid point, and the Germans had a two year head start on the project, beginning real research into nuclear piles in 1939 about the same time as the attack on Poland.

But the US research effort dwarfed the German, with the US funding and number of scientists literally an order of magnitude greater, not to mention having the best of the European scientists involved in our project - Einstein being the moral and spiritual leader, and Fermi being the one who actually applied the results. A German jew and Italian, respectively.

So, no, we couldn't know we were going to get there first with certainty - but it was certainly likely.

And the converse is true - when that decision was made, we also wouldn't have known about the coming of the Jet age or the V-rockets.

But regardless, the United States would have been safe behind the Atlantic fleet for at least the first half of the decade against German intervention - if they couldn't mount a successful invasion of the UK, one against the US eastern seaboard seems extremely unlikely.

On the other side of the debate:
http://physicsweb.org/articles/world/18/6/3
That's an interesting link to a book that presents evidence released by the Russians that the Germans were actually further along than we thought.

Isn't that the way it always is in foreign affairs? It's never out of the "goodness of your heart".

I thought you orgasmed over the "enlightenment" of their so called "cheese-eating commie-surrenderisms."

That sounds painful.