When was the last time the French won a war?

Robert G

It's not just a joke.

As any serious student of history is apt to find out once he/she decides to research it for him/herself, the last time the French won a non-civil war, without the help of an even greater number of allies, was some time before they were conquered by the Romans, if then.

For a very entertaining analysis of the facts, all one needs do is go to google (yahoo doesn't allow this), type in "french military victories" and click the 'I Feel Lucky' button, which will lead you to the page I've listed below.

In my own personal opinion, the reason France as a country hasn't been swollowed up time and time again like what happened from the Romans, is that France is the epitome of agricultural wealth, and that instead of spending all their time fighting, they spent most of their time garnering mass amounts of food and tremendous varieties of foods, and were mostly able to BUY their way out of warfare by bribing the enemy with some form of tribute, until that enemy wound up losing to, and buffering France from, some other enemy.

So, even though it is true that France has failed to win any wars on its own since at least before their fall to the Roman Empire, France is NOT by any means a joke.

Adam M

From what I hear, the French Foreign Legion ain't nothing to sneeze at.

artilleryman89

No clue..but I don't think your giving the French resistance enough credit. They sabotaged a lot of German supplies. 1 out of every 10 artillery shells was a dead because of them. That's a funny joke by the way..lol.

Its not me Its u

Cote d'Ivoire - January 2003
French peace-keeping forces succeed in stabilization of lawless western border

Battle of Maysalun - 1922
French forces rout the Syrian army.

Battle of Foochow - 1884
French navy forces utterly destroy the Chinese navy

Battle of Solferino - 1859
The French are victorious over the Austrians

Sean G

Actually, US Involvement in WWI came very late. We didnt get one single US made Artillery Piece, Aircraft, Tank to the front before the Armistice. Our Troops fought well, but there wasnt enough to make a tremendous difference in the short time we had forces fighting.

France did the Heavy Lifting during that war, google Verdun. So I would give them that, more so than Russia which signed a truce with Germany.

Oh, by the way the Soviet Union didnt exist during WWI

I AM THE RIGHT WING CONSPIRACY

depends what you define as the "french" if its the government well.......yeah. The people however contributed heavily to both world wars.

KERMIT M

The answer is World War I. The French did the vast majority of the fighting, killing and dying on the Western Front. The Russians surrendered. The Brits fought side by side with the French for all four years. The US showed up in the 4th Quarter and helped put the Allies over the top.

Make a point to visit Verdun the next time you want to question French martial prowess. There should be enough graves there to satisfy you. Especially since more French died there than we lost in the entire Second World War.

Honestly, the First World War and its devastating impact on the French has much to do with their current view of war. After 4 years of industrialized slaughter the French realized that war is about death...nothing more and nothing less.

Submariner 1

Google "French War Victories"
That is funny!

conranger1

France like America has fought in a lot of similar places despite the anally retentive french knockers who post asine remarks about the French, they are still Allied with NATO there Airforce is in service in Afghanistan today.

Np other country in WW1 on the Western front took such military or civilian casualties as the French, closely followed by the Belgians and the Russians on the Eastern Front.

French casualties in WWI.

World War I cost France 1,357,800 Military dead,
4,266,000 Military wounded (of whom 1.5 million were permanently maimed).
and 537,000 Military made prisoner or missing -- exactly 73% of the 8,410,000 men mobilized, according to William Shirer in The Collapse of the Third Republic.

Some context: France had 40 million citizens at the start of the war; six in ten men between the ages of eighteen and twenty-eight died or were permanently maimed.

10% of the active population and 3,5% of the total population died on the battlefields. As a comparison, if this were to happen now in the United States, the number of casualties would reach 10 million.

There would also be 680,000 widows and 760,000 orphans. Throughout Europe, the number of crippled soldiers amounted to 6,500,000.
Between 1914 and 1918, the drops in births in France is estimated at 1 million.

Regarding WWII, between 1939 (when war was declared by France and the United Kingdom) and 1940, 120,000 soldiers died, not to mention the number of French citizens who died as war prisoners, forced labourers, deported civilians or in acts of resistance against the Nazis during the German Occupation.

The amount of suffering occasioned by WWII in France is impossible to assess and should not be forgotten.

A Benway

i guess when they helped the american revolution

toodles

well they drove out the germans from alsace lorraine in 1945

yapyap_09

The French Revolution.

GunnyC

Mainland would have been the early Napoleonic but did lose that in the end; the war in the 1870's was the Franco-Prussian and they lost that, so by themselves would be the colonization of French Indo-China I would guess. Of course using the same criteria the Americans last won the Spanish American in 1898 and the British would go back to the late Napolonic Wars I would guess.

Cujo

lol, it's a trick question!!! the last war I can think of involving the French when the went into Vietnam before the American's did...and just like usual... they got their ***es kicked. (though the Americans did too)

Cappo359

I seem to recall them getting the upper hand on the Dutch about 500 years or so ago, but really, their win/loss record isn't too good.

"Going to war without the French is like going hunting without an accordian; you just leave a lot of useless, noisey baggage behind."

Mary Jo W

beats me.
don't think they ever did

toetagme

Thankfully they were on the winning side when they helped us defeat the British. Are you still pissed that they had the courage to stand up to Bush and his war mongering policies? Bully for France, we couldn't buy them like we bought the rest of the "coalition".

keeprockin

They did beat the Vietnamese in late 1800's
Alone,as far as I'm aware

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