Best Defense
Thomas E. Ricks' daily take on national security.

‘Nous sommes trahis!’: Alistair Horne on the French trait of looking for scapegoats

"Gallic pride can never admit that the nation has been collectively at fault; inevitably, she has been betrayed by an individual or faction."

Bundesarchiv_Bild_101I-127-0362-14,_Belgien,_belgischer_Panzer_T13
Bundesarchiv_Bild_101I-127-0362-14,_Belgien,_belgischer_Panzer_T13

 

 

Deep in his very good study, To Lose a Battle: France 1940, Alistair Horne identifies an unappealing French trait: “Gallic pride can never admit that the nation has been collectively at fault; inevitably, she has been betrayed by an individual or faction.”

Likewise, William Shirer, in his history of The Collapse of the Third Republic, reports that when a colonel trying to stop fleeing French soldiers, they brushed him aside, saying, “There’s no use trying to fight. There’s nothing we can do. We’re lost. We’ve been betrayed!”

Photo credit: Das Bundesarchiv/Wikimedia Commons

Thomas E. Ricks covered the U.S. military from 1991 to 2008 for the Wall Street Journal and then the Washington Post. He can be reached at ricksblogcomment@gmail.com. Twitter: @tomricks1

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