Whathello

73 years ago soldiers from 28th Inf Division on the Champs Elysées.

https://ww2db.com/image.php?image_id=18995

Just a reminder when sometimes people think there have to be 2 sides on this forum..
I thnik everybody was very glad to see the yankee boys and a lot of people remember it.

And I liked the picture...

IMDonehere

On our first trip in 1972, my wife and I were admiring the wrought iron work on the doors to Notre Dame. A well-dressed man in his 70's came over and engaged us in a conversation and offered to buy us coffee, which we accepted.

He said that he was showing his gratitude for what the Americans did during WWII. When we said, we were too young and had nothing to do with it and that it was parents and grandparents that deserve the thanks, he said, "Of course. But when you go home, tell them they are still appreciated."

Whathello

I started a conversation with a veteran on the 'pointe du Hoc' and included my son in the discussion, saying bascially the same thing.
The veteran thanked me... I told him it was like the world upside down.

Pegontheroad

This happened in Warsaw, not in Paris, but the gratitude is the same.

I was in the Insurgency Museum in Warsaw last year. I was sitting on a bench resting my tired feet when an old lady sat next to me. When she began speaking to me, I said, "I'm sorry. I'm an American, and I don't speak Polish. A few minutes later, she asked me if I spoke German.

I said, yes, and she began telling me her story. Her family was German, though she was born and raised in Poland. After the war, the family were displaced persons. They had to leave Poland and go to Germany.

She said they had nothing, just what they could carry in backpacks. But the Americans gave them "big, big," packages of food and clothing.

Coquelicot

About three years ago we were visiting a small manor house way out in the French countryside, on the heritage weekend, and the owner and his elderly dad asked where we were from. We said Etats Unis and the father got tears in his eyes. He just managed to say, "I was with the Americans in the war" and then he couldn't go on. I got choked up because he was choked up.

We've seen plaques in several places in France to honor specific named American soldiers who were killed during WW II.

chartley

My uncle is a Normandy veteran and is 92 years old. He still goes over to France from England for the Liberation celebrations every June. I think he likes being kissed by French women.

PalenQ

Some of my French in-laws remember the day the Americans marched into Orleans - liberating the French and in days after kids delighted in getting chewing gun from the troops. They are heroes and still are to the dwindling few to recall them.

My ex sister-in-law worked for American at Orleans military base and loved it - just loved the Americans as she does now.

frenchaucoeur

About fifteen years ago we rented a gite in Brocotte-Hotot-en-Auge, a fairly remote part of Normandy not too far from Beuvron-en-Auge, from an older couple. They invited us to their home a couple of miles away for an aperitif one evening, during which they spoke at length about D-Day and their memories and their and their families' gratitude for American help in defeating Germany. It was a wonderful evening. My husband, who doesn't speak French, is a WWII buff who has read widely on D-Day, and he had a million questions for them. My French really got a workout that night!

kerouac

I'm sorry, but I would like to know how long this "gratitude" is supposed to last, since it expires sooner or later. Even though my mother married an American soldier, my own family memory tends to think of the rather indiscrimate Allied bombing of French cities to "liberate" the country. I do wonder if the Allies would have been so keen to bomb Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Southhampton or Manchester to save them as they were to destroy Caen, Le Havre, Nantes or Dunkerque. Obviously, we have forgiven them since we are still thanking them for their belated efforts to end the war, but it would be nice if the liberators would be a little more humble from time to time about some of the damage -- not all of which was necessary -- for which they were responsible.

In any case, obviously there is an expiration date for military gratitude, because I have never heard a single American come to France and thank the French for their support in the American revolution, which they probably would have lost if France had not sent an enormous amount of support and troops.

bilboburgler

K,

Given the accuracy of the equipment "we" had to use it would have been amazing if "we" hit anything we aimed at.

Don't worry about the American war of Independance.. the Brits remember ;-) but still managed the Entente Cordiale "with you guys"

Traveller51

Americans remembered the French Contribution to at least 1917, over 130 years after independence when American troops on arriving in France during World War 1 announced

“Nous voila, Lafayette (Lafayette, we are here!“

NewbE

Great stories (well, except for one cranky pants), keep them coming!

We just saw the new film Dunkirk last weekend, it was very moving, and certainly reminded one of the historic alliance between France and the US; as did the American TV series Turn: Washington's Spies, which is about the American Revolution (obviously).

Whathello

My grandmother was nearly killed by US bombing (was not a good idea in these times to live close to big trainstations) my grandfather was nearly bombed by the RAF (his fault he had given info on his own manufacture to the resistance to have it bombed)and a great uncle was strafed by USAF when in a POW camp in the Germany.

None took offense.

And it doesn't change anything about the bravery of the common soldiers who had only his shirt to protect him from the bullets spit by MG42's... Quite scary when I think two seconds about it.

We must see it in the light of then not now.
It was at the time perfectly acceptable to suffer casualties to be liberated (not Caen but Normandy received exxagerated bombings because it was feared the allied troops could be pushed back into the sea, so the allied deliberately destroyed all (most) of infrastructure. I don't blame them and nobody was ure at the time of the outcome so preserving the troops was a good idea - at the expense of civilians).
Dresden bombing was considered acceptable by all of us even if now we should see it as a warcrime.
So was probably Nagasaki - Hiroshima should have been enough. But I guess the guys who took the decision had seen survivors of POW camps in Burma or Philippines...

Southam

A picture can tell more than one story. Notice any black faces in this ceremonial parade?
A couple of years ago the Paris city museum re-examined its own show from 1946 on the liberation of Paris, and what attitudes it exposed to current thinking. Keeping black troops out of official photos was one policy of the American military that that show identified.

IMDonehere

I'm sorry, but I would like to know how long this "gratitude" is supposed to last, since it expires sooner or later
_________________________
I did not see one person say about that, except the exchange of heartfelt stories.

But in your case, the expiration date for common decency and civility occurred long ago. And you are much truer to today's Parisian.
_____________________


In any case, obviously there is an expiration date for military gratitude, because I have never heard a single American come to France and thank the French for their support in the American revolution, which they probably would have lost if France had not sent an enormous amount of support and troops.

__________________
Apparently you want to be as blind as you want. Every school child in America is taught that Lafayette and the French aided the American Colonists during our Revolution. People know the Statue of Liberty was a gift from the French. And when you travel across America there are countless places named places of French origin including about a dozen states.

So kerouac, go find another topic to cr-p on.

Coquelicot

We learned about Lafayette in school. I don't know whether that is still taught but, even if not, probably a lot of Americans who saw the "Hermione" replica when it sailed up the east coast a few years ago learned then about Lafayette and his troops coming to the aid of the colony.

There are only eight honorary citizens of the US--Lafayette is one of them.

tomboy

I think Kerouac has been spending time in the northern Caribbean, raining on the Texas/Louisiana coastline.

I recommend, K, that you visit the Sahara and Mongolian Deserts. Your talents would be better appreciated there.

We were in a restaurant near Vaison la Romaine 3 years ago. A man about 85+ from across the room came over (apparently hearing us converse in English), introduced himself as a Belgian citizen, who wanted to express his appreciation for saving his country.

40 years ago I was at a stamtisch in Bavaria, chatting with a German fellow (who turned out to be one of Stauffenburg's collaborators who attempted to kill Hitler...but that's another story). A guy on the other side of the table (might have been Kerouac) started grousing about how the Americans bombed Dresden. I mentioned to him that NO ONE comes out clean in a S#!T fight, so it would have been wiser for Hitler not to invade Poland, nor to bomb Coventry. He had another beer, and shut up.

kerouac

The last time I heard an American thanking a complete stranger for a historical event was in Vietnam when a vet told a tour guide "thank you for not hating us in spite of what we did to your country." Americans like to receive thanks from total strangers for something that they did not do, but you rarely hear them saying thank you in return. Excessive diet of Freedom fries, perhaps.

IMDonehere

Your hate for Americans is so irrational, but so Parisian.

Would you like a thank you, you can hang on your refrigerator? Would you like a thank you, your mommy or daddy never gave you?

The friggin fact that so many Americans visit Paris and France, should be indication to most rational people that they appreciate the French at some level. I have a friend who is a member of the American Friends of the Louvre and is teaching his children French. Besides being a Francophile, he is a most admirable human being.

kerouac

I have no hatred of Americans. I have an American passport.

PUI is never a good idea, IMDonehere.