However, you ought to hear the other side of the story as well. Undoubtedly the most notorious British action (and the one which caused the most long-term resentment amongst the French people, lasting well after the war) was the death of almost 2000 of their sailors due to the British navy bombardment attack on the heavy French naval units at anchor in an Algerian port.

Unlike the ones at Toulon, these French naval units were not subject to any immediate danger of being seized intact by the Germans. Of course, Churchill viewed the matter as one of capability rather than intent; he was afraid the French would sail for Toulon to join the French navy units located there, making it too tempting a prize for Hitler not to grab. And the British couldn’t afford to tie up major British fleet assets to blockade Algeria indefinitely while the French decided what to do.

And afterwards, several French naval vessels did in fact escape from Mers and sail to Toulon:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A.....K%C3%A9bir

I’m sure Churchill must have justified the attack on Mers in your reading as a hard but necessary decision; however, in retrospect IMO it was almost certainly unnecessary (see the comment in the wiki article by the British admiral commanding the bombardment at Mers).

This lack of necessity is shown by the actions of the French naval forces in harbor at Toulon in France proper on 27 Nov 42, when they were in fact subject to the immediate presence of German forces who were trying to seize all their remaining ships:

http://www.bobhenneman.info/bhst.htm

Churchill should have had more faith in the honor of his former French allies.

Besides bombing the hell out of former allies in order to prepare for invasion and weaken Germany’s war effort, there were a lot of other things done by the allies that could raise the ire of some natives - and did raise the heckles of some of the leadership in the former allies.

I was just reading of Britain invading Madagascar with a small commando group with support units in 1942 to secure a naval base that would be troublesome if it fell into Japanese hands. The island was Vichy French at the time, and they did fight back, though the book states most of the locals were not in line with the French government’s anti-British position.

I also remember from having read the earlier volumes of Churchill’s series sometime before, I believe it was, that De Gualle himself was angry about the British attacking and sinking French warships when it became clear France was going to surrender and was going to refuse to send its warships to Britain or neutral ports for the duration of the conflict. I believe they even boarded some French vessels by force that were docked in England, if my memory is holding up.

That stuff did create a lot of bad blood at the time, but doesn’t seem to have held after the war.

Churchill also talks about bad blood over having bombed Paris production facilities early in the war, I believe it was, as a defensive measure way before the UK was into strategic bombing of Germany and conquered nations.

Anyway, you would think that compensation was going to be raised by anybody, it might be Japan and the citizens of Nagasaki and Hiroshima, but I don’t think that has happened much.

Perhaps the massive Marshal Plan that helped rebuild all of Europe, including enemy nations, and the help rebuilding Japan was considered just compensation?

Its just too much to hope the Koreans would see it the same way….

What’s truly disappointing about episodes like this, though, is the complete silence of the pstensibly responsible Korean political leadership of all political stripes in the face of this sort of mewling.

Very good point.

I doubt if Normandy resident would quite take to it that way, if you were to present the proposition to them in those terms. However –

I can recall reading print articles (and seeing TV shows) about the D-Day celebrations in the Normandy area on both the 40th and 50th anniversaries. American/British/Canadian flags on display everywhere and the residents were really glad to see Americans.

You might think it was only the older generation who would have this attitude but my vague recollection is that the authors/reporters said it extended into the younger generation as well. I sure don’t recall anything being said about how this gratitude is due (in whole or even in part) to any US monetary compensation schemes, direct from Uncle Sam to indiv Frenchmen

It probably helps that US war graveyards are present in the Normandy area, and also that we haven’t had garrisons of young soldiers present continously since the war annoying the natives. De Gaulle did us a big favor (in retrospect; we didn’t see it that way at the time) in giving US forces stationed in France the boot in 1965-66 — lock stock and barrel.

A similar ROK “force de frappe”, followed by the consequent withdrawl of all US forces — that’s the ticket, one that will lead to the best of all possible worlds. Either a north/south embrace of amour propre, or un coup de deux veuves; machts nichts, as long as les Amis are “out from under”.

The Aussies were actually the first nation to fly aircraft over Korea and were involved in a number of friendly fire incidents as well as accidental strafing of civilians.

The fact this committee is going after US civilian casualty incidents only shows that this is nothing more than another attempt to promote anti-US sentiment. The truth of what really happened matters little.