From: ralph295@comcast.net   
      
   On Mon, 03 Jul 2006 21:37:17 +1200, John  wrote:   
      
   >unit244@defencecontracts.org.uk wrote:   
   >> The British help the American forces, share intelligence, etc. Has   
   >> America become so paraniod (stupid) to not even trust one of its oldest   
   >> allies?   
   >>   
   >Getting further off topic, I know, but wasn't America's oldest ally France?   
      
   The Netherlands has a claim there too...it was the first foreign power   
   to recognize the United States as a country, and sold us saltpeter   
   from its Caribbean mines to make gunpowder.   
      
   But France went much further...without the Marquis de Layayette,   
   General Rochambeau's army, Admiral deGrasse's fleet and one million   
   livres of French money, we'd have been speaking English today...;-)   
      
   The expenditure  bankrupted the court of Louis XVI and set off   
   France's own revolution. Lafayette allied himself with the moderate   
   Girondist faction and wrote George Washington pleading for some   
   reciprocal support. Washington refused, the Girondists collapsed, the   
   radical Jacobins hijacked the revolution, France descended into bloody   
   chaos, and into the power vacuum rode Napoleon.   
      
   Napoleon bankrupted France yet again with his military adventures, and   
   sold us Louisiana to pay for them -- and the longterm result was that   
   Katrina hit the US instead of France.   
      
   rj   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)