Poseur aristos get in front of the stinking peasants. Or use Spaniard peons as props. Or let the stoopid Ricains do the actual fighting. Whatever. Just a day at the office on Planet Pepe.
Monday, April 06, 2009
How the French liberated Paris
Poseur aristos get in front of the stinking peasants. Or use Spaniard peons as props. Or let the stoopid Ricains do the actual fighting. Whatever. Just a day at the office on Planet Pepe.
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Could be. This is the first time I read about this angle. The story I knew is that de Gaulle asked Eisenhower to let him get into Paris first (I think everyone agrees on that), making the case that otherwise the Commies will get on top (a reasonable worry at the time: Pepe's buddies were just chomping at the bit to start painting the town in red). At any rate, the story I know says that Patton pulled back (or perhaps drove ahead in hot pursuit of the Boche), while Leclerc and his Division Blindée drove into Paris, which was eerily devoid of Germans. At least that's what I vaguely remember from, eg, Paris brûle-t-il.
Now, there were certainly Senegalese tirailleurs in the French Free Forces at the time, and they served as cannon fodder, for sure, while the aristos were sitting pretty. (Note that the wiki article just linked to the Beeb story -- this was not something that well-known previously.) Whether they had such a big role as the Beeb says is of course doubtful. But the gist of the story (Pepean aristos vs stinking peasants, aahhh the French, etc -- all perrenial themes on FCP) stays.
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