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CNN Live Saturday
The French Connection
Aired March 15, 2003 - 18:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
RENAY SAN MIGUEL, CNN ANCHOR: The possibility of war with Iraq has opened a rift between the U.S. and France, one that seems to get deeper by the day.
Huge crowds of demonstrators converged on the streets of Paris to show their opposition to any military action against Iraq. Some even carried signs calling President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair the axis of evil.
CNN's Bruce Morton takes a look at the long history of ups and downs between France and the United States.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRUCE MORTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The Marquis de Lafayette led a French contingent which fought for the American revolutionaries. His statute in a park that bears his name faces the White House.
More than 100 years later, General John "Black Jack" Pershing led an American force through France. And the Yanks helped win a war in which 1.4 million Frenchmen died.
And the Americans came again a generation later, landing in Normandy. D-Day it was called. The invasion which would drive the Nazis out of France and help end World War II. A cemetery at Codile (ph) holds the remains of some Americans who died that died.
And at the end of the Pacific War, British ground troops and U.S. Naval forces drove a Vietnamese named Ho Chi Minh out of Hanoi, so that Indochina could be a French colony, again.
That didn't last. Ho came back, laid siege to the French at a place called Dien Ben Fu (ph). The French asked President Dwight Eisenhower for help for air strikes. Ike said, no. The fort fell, and French rule ended.
In Europe, the U.S. championed the Marshall Plan, which helped winners and losers, France and Germany, rebuild, but relations weren't always easy. President Charles de Gaulle led France out of NATO's military command. Jacqueline Kennedy spoke French and charmed him, but it didn't last.
De Gaulle and other French resisted Anglais, English creeping into their language with words like "le weekend." The French did not all fall in love with Mickey Mouse, when he came calling. Some French found Americans rude, crude and brash. Some Americans found the French arrogant and snobbish. The French criticized the U.S. for repeating French mistakes in Vietnam and then, Iraq.
Was the U.S. undiplomatic? Maybe.
BUSH: America has no truer friend than Great Britain.
MORTON: Probably true, but maybe not what the French and Germans wanted to hear. Was the U.S. undiplomatic?
DONALD RUMSFELD, DEFENSE SECRETARY: You're thinking of Europe as Germany and France. I don't. I think that's old Europe.
MORTON: And France's President Chirac, quote "war is always, always the worst solution." From a French man old enough to remember Adolf Hitler, that's debatable.
So feelings are raw, and fries in the U.S. House of Representatives are French no longer. Many Americans have liked the French. Remember Bogie and Bergman in "Casablanca?"
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "CASABLANCA")
INGRID BERGMAN, ACTRESS: What about us?
HUMPHREY BOGART, ACTOR: We'll always have Paris.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MORTON: Maybe we won't. But I'm still going to ask for French fries.
Bruce Morton, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired March 15, 2003 - 18:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
RENAY SAN MIGUEL, CNN ANCHOR: The possibility of war with Iraq has opened a rift between the U.S. and France, one that seems to get deeper by the day.
Huge crowds of demonstrators converged on the streets of Paris to show their opposition to any military action against Iraq. Some even carried signs calling President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair the axis of evil.
CNN's Bruce Morton takes a look at the long history of ups and downs between France and the United States.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRUCE MORTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The Marquis de Lafayette led a French contingent which fought for the American revolutionaries. His statute in a park that bears his name faces the White House.
More than 100 years later, General John "Black Jack" Pershing led an American force through France. And the Yanks helped win a war in which 1.4 million Frenchmen died.
And the Americans came again a generation later, landing in Normandy. D-Day it was called. The invasion which would drive the Nazis out of France and help end World War II. A cemetery at Codile (ph) holds the remains of some Americans who died that died.
And at the end of the Pacific War, British ground troops and U.S. Naval forces drove a Vietnamese named Ho Chi Minh out of Hanoi, so that Indochina could be a French colony, again.
That didn't last. Ho came back, laid siege to the French at a place called Dien Ben Fu (ph). The French asked President Dwight Eisenhower for help for air strikes. Ike said, no. The fort fell, and French rule ended.
In Europe, the U.S. championed the Marshall Plan, which helped winners and losers, France and Germany, rebuild, but relations weren't always easy. President Charles de Gaulle led France out of NATO's military command. Jacqueline Kennedy spoke French and charmed him, but it didn't last.
De Gaulle and other French resisted Anglais, English creeping into their language with words like "le weekend." The French did not all fall in love with Mickey Mouse, when he came calling. Some French found Americans rude, crude and brash. Some Americans found the French arrogant and snobbish. The French criticized the U.S. for repeating French mistakes in Vietnam and then, Iraq.
Was the U.S. undiplomatic? Maybe.
BUSH: America has no truer friend than Great Britain.
MORTON: Probably true, but maybe not what the French and Germans wanted to hear. Was the U.S. undiplomatic?
DONALD RUMSFELD, DEFENSE SECRETARY: You're thinking of Europe as Germany and France. I don't. I think that's old Europe.
MORTON: And France's President Chirac, quote "war is always, always the worst solution." From a French man old enough to remember Adolf Hitler, that's debatable.
So feelings are raw, and fries in the U.S. House of Representatives are French no longer. Many Americans have liked the French. Remember Bogie and Bergman in "Casablanca?"
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "CASABLANCA")
INGRID BERGMAN, ACTRESS: What about us?
HUMPHREY BOGART, ACTOR: We'll always have Paris.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MORTON: Maybe we won't. But I'm still going to ask for French fries.
Bruce Morton, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
