Are the French really poor soldiers?

Question

I hear a lot of Americans criticize the French war record, and French soldierly characteristics, but are the French poor soldiers, or have France's failures in battle been a result of a confused political system?

Good point, Samantha! And the French have mostly fought the Germans. To quote Field Marshal Montgomery, "If you've never fought the Germans, you've never fought".

You're absolutely right, madskier. The USSR won WW2

They did pretty well, until Napoleon was defeated, and they switched back to a republican form of government.

just to confuse it a bit, a large portion of Napoleon's armies were actually Germans

Answer 1

French Military casualties in WWI.

World War I cost France 1,357,800 military dead,

On the 22/08/1914 27,000 French soldiers are killed on this single day in an offensive thrust to the east of Paris, towards the German borders.

YES!! 27 THOUSAND DEAD SOLDIERS ON ONE DAY, stop for a second and think about it, twenty-seven thousand fathers, sons, husbands, lovers, killed in one day, not counting the hundreds of thousands of wounded.

4,266,000 military wounded (of whom 1.5 million were permanently maimed) and 537,000 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.

WORLD WAR 2:

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 laborers, 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.

Answer 2

There were a number of key factors resulting in the Prussian victory. Firstly they had universal conscription so they managed to put more soldiers in the field than the French. The biggest factor however was superior generalship which was due to the the professional staff system employed by the Prussians which ensured that the most competent officers rose to the highest command positions. Throughout the war you constantly find that in spite of French tenacity and courage their troops were continually outmanoevered by superior Prussian generalship which contrasts with the ineptitude often exhibited by some of their French counterparts.

Answer 3

In short yes the french are not good soldiers. The contribution of Lafayette in the Revoltionary War was not leading French troops but working with Amrican troops and gaining supplies from the French; very few French ground forces were involved; the French Navy formed a blockade to stop the British from resupplying and reinforcing Cornwallis at Yorktown and that really was the main French contribution. The "French" army under Napolean was between 70-80 percent non-French, mainly Austran and what would now be Germans. The "over-whelmed by the German numbers" is sort of odd since France has a larger population. Poor tactics was part of the French problem in World War Two but the rest of it was a lack of will to fight by French troops; the French armor was superior to German armor at that time they just did not use it well and after the Germans flanked the French defenses they did not move and fight but rather sat and surrendered. As far as the U.S. gettingin late after the years of fighting had worn the Germans down; true but had little to do with the French especially in WW2 where they lasted weeks or explain the Franco-Prussian War which is one of the few times the French fought the Germans one on one and were soundly defeated despite having more troops and the best bolt action rifle of he time; that defeat led to the unification of the Germanic proviences into a unified Germany which had not existed until that time. The French Foreign Legion is the best that the French have and it is illegal for a French citizen to serve in it except as an assigned officer and as said before that really does say something about the nation.

Answer 4

Soldiers are soldiers. They are only as good as their training, and can only perform based on the intel that can be gathered.

The French lost ground in WWII because they banked on the Germans attacking directly from Germany, not going through other countries and attacking from the flank. Intel didn't tell the French gov't that it was a viable possibility, so Hitler was able to capture France.

The French seem (to me) to focus more on UN Peacekeeping Missions, rather than overt actions, such as the Brits and Americans do. The fact that America and England are such allies, as well as the French is ironic, since it was the French that assisted the colonies in the Revolutionary War to beat the Brits.

If you look at history, countries have been looked at based on how strong their military might. France was on top for a while, as well as Spain, Italy, England, and currently the US. I forsee that China could easily become the major world power, not because of military might, but their vast economy and importance to the current world leaders.

If China and Russia ally themselves with Iran, that would be bad for the US and the EU.

I don't think anyone could say that France's military "failures" are a result of a confused political system. They have a similar system to that of other European countries. Look hundreds of years ago...Napoleon was the leader of which country when he practically did exactly what Hitler tried to do? Right, France. I can't see that as a failure overall.

Answer 5

The individual French soldier over the years has been a fine and brave individual, as proven on the battlefields of the first world war in particular.

You have to remember that in the first world war France lost an entire male generation, in battles which took the lives of up to a quarter of a million men per day, and not only that, it took place on French soil.

Its no surprise therefore that when they were faced with similar devastation 20 years later they couldnt face it.

Look at the effect of 2,000 body bags coming out of Iraq is having on the U.S public and imagine that happening every hour for four years.

France also has a totally screwed political system, based on a revolution which left the army always fighting for politics and unclear goals.

In recent years the french did well in gulf War one and in the Balkans.

Answer 6

French troops were VITAL to the success of OUR revolutionary war.

If French troops were no good - we'd still be English. If those troops were NOT as vital as I make them out to be - there wouldn't be LAFAYETTE park (and general Lafayette statue) directly opposite the WHITEHOUSE, to show the gratitude of the American people to the French.

Of course, America has traditionally been late to wars - WWI & WWII especially. As a result France has been fighting - sometimes for years - and has been worn down by generally German superior numbers.

In the case of WWII, where the Germans rolled across France - De Gaul was given command by the politicians, after years of fighting and had no troops - at that particular point, America sided with the enemy, with the Nazi sympathising Vichy French who sent tens of thousands of people to the gas chambers.

Anyone still in doubt shoudl read about the Battle of Verdun - on of the longest battles in history - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Verdun

As for French civilians - consider that they lost more French civilians (resistance fighters) in WWII, than they lost troops - that is not a people who just give up.

France lost twenty times as many civilians as the USA did.

Answer 7

I wouldn't criticize the French war record. Sure, they've had some humiliating defeats, but show me a people who hasn't had those?

Answer 8

I think basically when the best troops the french have are not even french but foreigners in the legion, that pretty much sums up a nation, in not a very good light either.

And I would not be that sure the French were on the US side in the war the only came in with mostly naval support and did an action of basically just running away but distracting the British navy from supporting land forces, a typical french "victory" in other words, running away

And Samantha I pretty much doubt the winners of the US Revolutionary war were liberals in fact were they around today I bet they would be pretty conservative.

dryheatdave, how many French soldiers took part in the US revolutionary war ? were there any whole french Units ? in fact I bet there was more british born soldiers on the US side than frenchmen, indeed if it were not for scots-irish you would not have won, I fail to see how one frenchmen who gets a statue constitues such great french on land military aide ! and like I said the french navy might have chosen good tactics in running away from the British navy and getting the desired result, but harldly noble was it ? just typical french run away and not risk their fleet.

Answer 9

As an interesting aside last I checked...probably a year ago they had the second highest number of trrops in Afganistan after the US for the war against the Taliban and Al Quaeda.

I do like the story about why Euro Disney had stop the evening fireworks...It seems the French kept Surrendering

Answer 10

Sometimes the french have had good troops, but almost always they have had bad leaders both military and political, deeply flawed battlefield doctrine, and an amateurish lack of operational grasp.
Inferior troops would not have defended Verdun as they did - one doubts whether the italians would have done so.