France

Didnt they mostly fight a bunch of spear armed Africans? That doesn't seem too glorious to me.

"No"
Stormcloaks > Legion

>What does Veeky Forums think of French military history?
Cheese eating surrender monkeys armed with white flags and tanks that go fastest in reverse gear.

My grandpa brought lots of French rifles home after WW2. As good as new, dropped once, never fired.

...

Without a doubt the worst spasticated meme image I've ever seen. I really hope you're a brit trying to put Europeans to shame.
>italy
>roman

France is without a doubt the most militarily successful European power. It has the best record of W/L. Memers like are either baiting or just too busy looking at r/polandball to know the truth.

>gay shit videogames

THe French are probably the most consistent military great power throughout all of European history. One could also argue the Austrians, though they've fallen from power since.

>very narrowly lose to a numerically superior force of British, Prussians, and Germans.
>Shameful defeat

>Their record is spotty as far as victories/losses
Technically I think they have the most militarily successful history of any nation.

That's not actually true at all, they also fought other European empires in the New World along with niggers, chinks, redskins, and abboes.

If you were half the man your mother was, you would admire the British Empire for its feats, but alas it seems you lack the testosterone to love the greatest empire that ever existed.

Here's how "big" the British Empire was in 1815
It never fought any colonial war with another european nation past that point, which means that everything conquered after that (roughly 80% of the British Empire) was taken from tribal third worlders
Face it, the British Empire wasn't an impressive feat militarily speaking
It was impressive on the diplomatical and commercial aspect, but certainly not on the militaristic one

I r-refuse to acknowledge this!

This. They were logistical Geniuses. They're administrative prowess was unmatched.

It'll take more than shooting a bunch of comparatively unarmed the third worlders to make my dick hard.

I unironically agreed with you on everything until
>the greatest empire that ever existed

dude you're in denial. half of the surface was unexplored land (Canada, Australia) and you still could not face Germany or France alone with all your might. You've never durably set foot in Europe. There's a lot to impress in the UK, but the Empire is just a meme. A sad one too.

Besides the outlier of Napoleon they were trash. Evem then he got btfo twice and his reign was short.

>btfo by russia
>btfo by uk
>btfo by germany
>btfo by germany again needed to be rescued by half the world
>btfo by africans
>btfo by germany a 3rd time
>become commies and fade into obscurity

>It was impressive on the diplomatical and commercial aspect, but certainly not on the militaristic one

What's the problem? This is friggen good. It puts the British empire at forefront of civilization. Military conquest ultimately claims nothing in the long run since ongoing generations of butthurt combinate in revolts.

>"hurr the list of countries that beat them is long"

That tends to happen when a country has the habit of fighting alone against huge coalitions as seen there Still what I see on that pic is very impressive and unmatched except maybe by Germany in the WWs

>And why have French uniforms been the most aesthetic in Europe?
Not since the Napoleonic Wars.
In WW1 and WW2 the Germans and other countries beat them.

Even India, its most impressive conquest considering its level of civilization, was mostly taken piecemeal through financial dickery and outlasting and overwhelming any Indian princeling that didn't buy into the empire.

>ignoring the sun king
Seriously, he seems so underrated on Veeky Forums

On a related note, does anyone have a good book to read on him? I just finished one on the 30 Years War and I really want to follow the chain

>hey guys, let's cherrypick France in the 20th century to summarize its military history, that will get them good

The first one that comes to mind is Tim Blanning's "Pursuit of Glory"

>btfo by germany a 3rd time

1871, 1940 and?

So they have terrible leadership and terrible strategically? Just because you troops fight well doesn't mean shit you need to be the whole package. France was consistently lead by shit throwing monkeys.

Both World wars son. If it wasnt for tea drinkers and Dutch saving your lines France would have been in German hands in less than 6 months.

bad bait

Now that's some bad quality bait

>if France hadnt had allies, they'd have lost

That's true for literally EVERY SINGLE war Britain ever fought in Europe
Unlike France that has won many wars alone (as seen there ), Britain has literally NEVER won a big european war on its own
So if needing allies to win negates your victory, I have bad news for Brits

I'll never understand that pathetic double standards
Brits brag all the time about "their" victory in the Napoleonic Wars and WW2 (although thet barely contributed), but WW1 must be counted as a defeat for France because, even though they did contribute more than anyone else to the victory, they happened to need allies to win for once in their history
I guess it has to do with expectations, regarding French and British militirary histories before that point

>in less than 6 months.
>the BEF only grew to the proportion large enough for it lead offensives on its own in 1917, therefore 3 year following when the war had started
What did mean by this?

>France was consistently lead by shit throwing monkeys.
Napoleon was possibly the best military leader of all time desu

HHNNNNNNGGGGG

He somehow thinks that the 30,000 Brits that took part in the Battle of the First Marne were more decisive in stopping the 1,485,000 advancing Germans than the 1,040,000 Frenchmen pitted against them

Tl;dr: He's Lindybeige

It was Germany vs 4 countries from the start and you needed help the whole time. No one is defending those cucks in the UK but that doesn't free you from blame.

The BEF is the only reason the Fench northern line held and the Marn wasnt a disaster.

Napoleon was fine but was basically using Prussians for the dirty work most of his major battles. He is a meme that failed and threw his country away for nothing.

Turns out 30k worth of troops that aren't cowards can be worth 10x their weight.

>troops that aren't cowards

Too bad they were British then

>was basically using Prussians for the dirty work most of his major battles.

>it's another revisionist hiatory episode

>It was Germany vs 4 countries from the start and you needed help the whole time. No one is defending those cucks in the UK but that doesn't free you from blame.

I am actually not French but German
I don't think anyone can deny that we were the best in that war, and the French (as much as I respect their military history) just were no match
The 20th century was our century, not France's

But I'm tired of British faggots who never accomplished anything impressive militarily speaking shitting on them all the time (when it's not on us), without seeing they've pretty much always been more pathetic than the French even at their worst

>The BEF is the only reason the Fench northern line held and the Marn wasnt a disaster.

t. delusional Brit
Brits were literally irrelevant on the Western Front until late 1916

Pic kinda related, another episode of British delusion

>Napoleon was fine but was basically using Prussians for the dirty work most of his major battles

Pfffffffffffft are you even trying?
The only moment Napoleon even had Prussians under his command was during the failed Invasion of Russia

Im not a dirty brit. Just because they didn't commit the most doesn't mean they weren't important in the early battles. The french line was horribly arrayed much like WW2 and was begging to be shattered if the Dutch and Brits didn't fight as well as they did. The french artillery was dog shit early on.

Ya the dirty work >_

Six British divisions were present at the Marne, more than 100,000 men (yes that is decisive).

German numbers were less than 1 million

The Dutch were neutral in WW1, faggot
You're confusing with Waterloo (during which most "British" troops were Dutch)

>Dutch

What?

Belgium. Its all shitty dutch.

French posters are so assblasted because of the white flag meme that they constantly have to make dickwaving threads/posts

They're the most complex-ridden sort of posters on this board

>German numbers were less than 1 million

Hurr durr

>unsourced wikipedia screencap

wow i'm impressed

try reading actual books next time

You're the assblasted faggot here, calling anyone who defends France a French poster and making other retarded vaseless assumptions

Visit /int/ and you'll see that most people defending France arent even French, just educated people from all over the world who are tired of this propaganda bullshit
Pic related

Belgium did absolutely nothing but get stomped and halt the Germans a little bit by sabotaging their own railroads.

>my unsourced opinion is more relevant and trustable than this well known encyclopedia website

k

Keep telling yourself that Pierre. Without them holding the German machine up it wouldn't have been close. They flooded the country and killed thousands more than the Germans ever thought possible.

I'm Brazilian, but militarily they really didn't do much, they only halted the Germans a bit, avoiding a swift Team victory like the Schlieffen envisioned

Tynge, The Campaign of the Marne should have the numbers of divisions, you can go from there.

babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015027914582;view=1up;seq=21

Right now I only found numbers for German strenght at the whole Western front in 1914. The numbers translate roughly to 1.5 million, which means that 1.485 million at the Marne alone are obviously bogus

and if germany didn't have austrohungary and ottomans fighting for them they would have gotten overwhelmed from the south by italy and east by russia

The only reason Italy was in the war was because of Austria-Hungary and Italy wouldn't even have had the possibility of invading Germany from the south without going through Austria-Hungary or Switzerland. And they didn't enter the war until 1915 anyway. Austria-Hungary couldn't even defeat Serbia in 1914 and Germany had to send help to them on all their fronts (though in some ways Germany benefited from for example the easy victory against Romania that refilled their supplies a bit).

Though in the end it doesn't really matter anyway. Germany lost the war when they lost against the French at the Marne and failed to take Paris in 1914. They managed to take some of France's most important lands - including a massive portion of French steel industry - and occupy them for a large part of the war but what they needed was a knockout blow to defeat their enemy in detail. Between two fronts and the UK's navy victory was pretty fucking unlikely even if Germany's army could have smashed France or Russia on their own with relative ease.

To be clear though I'm not defending the statement that the British land forces saved France in 1914.

Thanks user, I'll check it out

>France lost WW1
What do germanoboo mean by this?

I guess it must be embarrassing that Wellington acknowledged Napoleon as the better general.