Our Oldest Enemy: A History of America's Disastrous Relationship with France [Hardcover]

John J. Miller (Author), Mark Molesky (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 5, 2004

Liberté? Egalité? Fraternité? Or just plain gall?


In this provocative and brilliantly researched history of how the French have dealt with the United States, John J. Miller and Mark Molesky demonstrate that the cherished idea of French friendship has little basis in reality. Despite the myth of the “sister republics,” the French have always been our rivals, and have harmed and obstructed our interests more often than not.

This history of French hostility goes back to 1704, when a group of French and Indians massacred American settlers in Deerfield, Massachusetts. The authors also debunk the myth of French aid during the Revolution: contrary to popular notions, the French did not enter the war until very late and were mainly interested in hurting their rivals, the British. After the war, the French continued to see themselves as major players in the Western hemisphere and shaped their policies to limit the growth and power of the new nation. The notorious XYZ affair, involving French efforts to undermine the government of George Washington, led to an undeclared naval war with France in 1798. During the Civil War, the French supported the Confederacy and installed a puppet emperor in Mexico.

In the twentieth century, Americans clashed with the French repreatedly. The French victory over President Wilson at Versailles imposed a short-sighted and punitive settlement on Germany that paved the way for the rise of fascism in the 1930s. During World War II, Vichy French troops killed hundreds of American soldiers in North Africa, and diehard French fascist units fought against the Allies in the rubble of Berlin. During the Cold War, Charles DeGaulle yanked France out of NATO and obstructed our efforts to roll back Soviet expansion.

The legacy of French imperial power has been no less disastrous. The French left Haiti in a shambles, got us into Vietnam, and educated many of the world’s worst tyrants at their elite universities, including Pol Pot, the genocidal Cambodian dictator. The fascist Baath regimes in Iraq and Syria are another legacy of failed French colonialism.

Americans have been particularly irritated by French cultural arrogance—their crusades against American movies, McDonalds, Disney, and the exclusion of American words from their language have always rubbed us the wrong way. This irritation has now blossomed into outrage. Our Oldest Enemy shows why that outrage is justified.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

National Review reporter Miller (The Unmaking of Americans) and Harvard lecturer Molesky focus quite single-mindedly on destroying what they say is the "myth" of the historical friendship between the United States and France. In doing so, they give short shrift to a few vital facts: for instance, while focusing on the French and Indian massacre of British colonists at Deerfield, Mass., in 1704, they overlook the importance of the French fleet in George Washington's great victory at Yorktown. Miller and Molesky also dismiss French policy as having a cynical underside of national self-interest, willfully overlooking the fact that all governments act out of self-interest. Thus, they call French trade barriers during the Cold War ingratitude for American aid in WWII. They accuse the French, who dare to look down on American culture, of their own "sordid cultural exports," such as the avant-garde, with its strain of nihilism. And, as the authors see it, the French, with the debacle at Dien Bien Phu, are responsible for America's quagmire in Vietnam. As one might guess, driving this revisionism is France's refusal to support the United States in its late invasion of Iraq The authors' ire, and their carefully selected and unnuanced slices of history, will convince only the already converted.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Lafayette, the Statue of Liberty, D-Day-- such symbolic shorthand for a historical alliance between France and America crumbles in the caustic viewpoint expressed by this historical review of their relationship. Miller, of the conservative National Review,^B and Molesky, a Harvard history lecturer, argue that animosity rather than amity has been the two countries' normal state of affairs, extending from the French and Indian War to the post-World War II pattern of frequent French diplomatic opposition to American foreign policy. The authors reflect on the sources of French anti-Americanism, maintaining it is, in part, because of France's resentment of its own decline as a great power and its cultural contempt for America as crass and materialistic. What may seem like the long-gone past, such as Napoleon III's pro-South policy in the Civil War, is presented as a seamless continuum to the present, representing the French proclivity for hampering the American "hyperpower," as one foreign minister recently called the U.S. Gratifying to a nationalist sensibility, Miller and Molesky's editorialized jaunt through history is fluid and opinionated. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Doubleday; 1ST edition (October 5, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385512198
• ISBN-13: 978-0385512190
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (94 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #364,397 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

81 of 109 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars What We Need to Know About France, October 29, 2004

By 

Pete (Birmingham, MI) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Our Oldest Enemy: A History of America's Disastrous Relationship with France (Hardcover)

Students of diplomatic history will find familiar material here. Their previous reading will have included scattered accounts of French perfidy in the New World and placed them on their guard against the myth of untarnished Franco-American amity. For the non-specialist, however, Miller and Molesky have performed an invaluable service by marshalling the salient facts into one book - and a most engaging and well-written one at that. Their demolition of the aforementioned myth is complete (but restrained) as they guide us through 300 years of French misadventures with the United States.

To be sure, the familiar facts of Franco-American friendship and assistance are recounted and form the background of the narrative. As these are well known they are explored in detail only when necessary (and perhaps when charity warrants that the authors not make France look as bad as it might deserve). The book, naturally, accentuates the negative but is hardly a litany of complaints. Facts are facts - and any student of Franco-American relations should understand how American friendships and alliances with France have been colored by deception, rivalry, and even open (though undeclared) war on the part of the French. The book's thesis may seem provocative - but by the time the narrative reaches the First World War most readers should be thoroughly convinced of its truth. Diplomatic history may seem like a musty and pedantic business to most Americans but Miller and Molesky's well-paced argument and enlightening revelations successfully elicit the dialectical agility required to think of France as (often simultaneously) ally and enemy.

Not, of course, an enemy of the Nazi or Soviet sort, but a persistent one nonetheless. Beginning with French massacres of New England colonists in the early 18th Century, the authors show us the transformation of colonial particularism into a more unified American identity as the several colonies propose a system of united defense against the French military encroachments that would come to be known as the French and Indian War of 1754. French aid during the Revolutionary War is accurately viewed in the light of balance-of-power struggles and France's wish to weaken its traditional rival Great Britain. The story of French assistance at Yorktown (which is not omitted, as the Publisher's Weekly reviewer mistakenly claims) is supplemented by an account of France's arrogant and often incompetent military "support" prior to and following that battle - an account that would strike many Americans as ridiculously comical if it didn't at the same time demonstrate how French hauteur and stupidity nearly aborted the nascent American republic in its struggle with Britain.

America's first naval victory, against France in the Quasi War of 1798-1800, is highlighted. Napoleon's sale of the Louisiana Territory to the United States is placed in its proper context and his chicanery in getting America to declare war on Britain (rather than France) in 1812 is detailed. Napoleon III's designs on weakening the US by supporting the South in the Civil War, his Mexican adventure, and his follies in general are well-handled by the authors. American military aid to France in the First and Second World Wars is juxtaposed against French's self-defeating nationalist intransigence during and after these conflicts. The authors take note of Operation Torch, the Allied invasion of North Africa during which French Vichy troops mercilessly attacked the Americans who were coming to liberate them. (Tip of the hat to the authors: I have not noticed an account of this episode in any of the other major histories of Franco-American relations.)

Vietnam, the Cold War (during the latter stages of which France proved to be a considerable help to the US - a fact which has not escaped the authors), and Iraq - all these conflicts are dealt with expertly by Miller and Molesky. Two things need to be added, however. When diplomatic historians come to write a full account of the origins of the war in Iraq they will note the diplomatic struggle that took place between the United States and France before George W. Bush even came to office. France's open non-compliance with the system of U.N.-imposed sanctions (something it was joined in by Russia and China) will be seen as one of the causes of American and British intervention. By subverting the diplomatically achieved system of sanctions France narrowed American options and rendered a more forceful treatment of Saddam Hussein likely. Finally, the "multi-polar world" favored by France today rests on the kind of thinking behind the balance-of-power system of "Old Europe" - a system more conducive to conflict and instability than the benign hegemony exercised by the United States today. Some may question whether this hegemony is currently "benign". But one thing is certain. As long as the United States holds such power in the world France cannot attain what its national pride most desires: a hegemony, or partial hegemony of its own.

An excellent read.

17 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Franco-American relations haven't always been rosy . . ., June 11, 2005

By 

Pierre (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Our Oldest Enemy: A History of America's Disastrous Relationship with France (Hardcover)

When reviewing a book, it usually helps if the reviewer has an accurate idea of what the book is about. Looking at most of the negative reviews below tells us more about the reviewers and their prejudices and less about the book they've supposedly read (although some admit that they haven't even bothered to read it). To begin with, most of these reviewers seem to think that the book pretends to be a complete history of Franco-American relations. If they look closely they'll find that the book itself has no such pretensions. It is a book about the antagonistic aspects of French and American relations. That's all. Why write such a book rather than a complete history? Well, there's a myth out there in the journalistic ether that holds that the Franco-American relationship was a centuries-old concert of amity and alliance -- that is, until George W. Bush, by going to war in Iraq, managed to produce an unprecedented rift with our "oldest ally". In a matter of months, he had supposedly soured, damaged, and nearly destroyed America's 200-year-old friendship with France. Actually, Bush did nothing of the sort. His administration is hardly the first to have had problems with France. There have been earlier and more serious rifts -- and even military hostilities: Franco-American friendship hadn't even lasted 20 years before the two nations went to war in 1797. One has to wonder why most of our journalists couldn't bring themselves to formulate their remarks in a more historically-informed way. Specifically, one has to wonder why they couldn't simply say that France and the United States had re-entered one of their periodic antagonisms. One explanation is that some of them are simply ignorant of the facts. Hence the need for a book like this.

But don't take it from me (or even from Miller and Molesky). Here to enlighten us is Jean-Baptiste Duroselle, author of "France and the United States: From the Beginnings to the Present Day" (Chicago, 1978):

"The quarrels [between France and the United States] have left their mark across two centuries of history. They began in 1782 with the peace negotiations, grew under France's National Convention, of which President Washington was decidedly not an admirer, reached a climax with the 'undeclared war' [the so-called Quasi-War], and continued from Jefferson to Jackson over the indemnities relating to the privateer war. They flared up again under Napoleon III over his Mexican adventure, then again early in the Third Republic over the Spanish-American War. The Dreyfus affair triggered off a campaign of censure in the American press. Then, after the friendly intermission of 1917-18, the conflict became more intense than ever, first over the treaty, in which Wilson was seen as being dominated by the 'cynical' Clemenceau, and then over the war-debt problem. After the fall of France in 1940 we find an amused contempt for de Gaulle the "prima donna" and later for the defects of the Fourth Republic, plus a certain disgruntlement over France's 25 percent Communist vote. Then, finally, under de Gaulle, there came the American exasperation at his 'ingratitude.' Meanwhile, on the French side, there were all those who formed the currents of anti-American feeling . . . : communists, neutralists, colonialists, and Gaullists." (Duroselle, p. 246.)

It would be preposterous, of course, to claim that Duroselle produced such a summary because he had a "neo-conservative" axe to grind. Yet Duroselle's paragraph could also serve as an accurate summary of Miller and Molesky's book, a book that has been (unjustly) derided as a repository of "les idées les plus extrêmes des néoconservateurs américains." It should be kept in mind that the facts of Franco-American animosity are not exactly a partisan invention. They are in the history books for all to see and need to be recollected rather than defended. On the other hand, it is precisely the myth of an abiding Franco-American amity that calls for critical scrutiny and justification in the face of recurrent historical tensions.

In short, the authors of "Our Oldest Enemy" do nothing more than remind us that friction with France has been quite common in American history. As such, it is rather ironic that Bernard-Henri Lévy should choose to admonish Miller and Molesky for their supposed "essentialism". In fact, their book is nothing less than a thorough debunking of the naïve essentialism implicit in the idea that there has been an enduring essence of Franco-American political friendship. Some readers, for whatever reason, may not wish to be disabused of this myth. I would recommend the book to them nonetheless.

32 of 43 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Disappointed in treatment of colonial wars, February 18, 2005

By 

Reader (Detroit, MI) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Our Oldest Enemy: A History of America's Disastrous Relationship with France (Hardcover)

Let me preface this by saying that I largely agree with the book's overall premise, that French political elites have an irrational fear of American political hegemony. That said, I am extremely disappointed in the book's opening chapter.

The authors' treatment of the wars between the British and French North American colonies is extremely one-sided and misleading. They would have you believe that the British colonists were a passive bunch who acted in self-defense against French aggressors and their vicious Indian allies. This is laughable in light of the facts that 1) the British colonies had literally 20 times the population of the French ones; 2) the British made it their explicit goal to conquer the French territories, as they had done to New Netherland and 3) the British made good on their claim, invading and conquering New France in 1759.

The authors mention the Deerfield massacre of 1704 while conveniently overlooking similar slaughters that occurred in Quebec, Port Royal and Montreal at the hands of the British. They also gloss over the expulsion of 10,000 Acadians from their colony (now Nova Scotia), something the French never did in territories they captured.

The authors acknowledge that the French made far more native allies than the British, but never pause to examine why this was the case. Whereas the British effectively wanted to create a reconstituted European state and push the natives out of the way, the predominantly fur-trading French colonists attempted to assimilate themselves into Native culture as much as the opposite. When the British attempted to expand their colonies, they met the fierce opposition of Native tribes, who did not want to see their French allies evicted. The authors ignore these details and instead treat the Native Americans as almost sub-human, even comparing them to weapons of mass destruction. And to top it off, they chide the French colonial rulers for "exploiting" the natives! This is ridiculous.

There is no reason for such a lopsided account of these events. I'm afraid that the authors' personal biases have clouded their judgment when it comes to covering the colonial wars.