April 01, 2003

Desecrated cemetery in Etaples, France where British soldiers killed in action in WWI and WWII are buried
French smear Brit dead

SICK French yobs [Brit slang for young thugs.--Jen] daubed a swastika and vile anti-war slurs at a cemetery for 11,000 British troops.

The showpiece cenotaph at the graveyard in Northern France was smeared in red paint with the words: “Dig up your rubbish. It’s fouling our soil.”

Other slogans at the Etaples cemetery near Boulogne included “Death to the Yankees” and “Saddam Hussein will win and spill your blood.”

And the vandals wrote “Rosbeefs go home” — the French insult for Brits is roast-beefs. Prime Minister Tony Blair and US President George Bush were also branded war criminals.

The graffiti was discovered by a shocked gardener and spotted by around 80 visitors. It was cleaned off the same day.

Roy Hemmington — spokesman for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission — said: “We are deeply offended. This is the strongest language and most vile graffiti I have witnessed at a war graves cemetery.

“The suggestion that the bodies of soldiers who died for France should be dug up is particularly foul.”

Most soldiers buried at the cemetery were defending France at the Somme and Ypres during World War I.

Another 122 are troops who died fighting the Nazis in World War II.

Among the dead are a winner of the Victoria Cross, 217 holders of the Military Medal and 69 holders of the Military Cross.

A number had been awarded France’s top military decoration, the Legion d’Honneur.

Roy added: “Almost every British regiment has war dead here. This insults just about the entire British Army.”

Anti-British feeling has been whipped up in France since President Jacques Chirac refused to let the UN back action against Iraq.

Last night Jim Kelleher, chief clerk to the Royal Fusiliers Association, said: “No sane person would do this. It is a disgrace. I have family buried in France and if I could get my hands on whoever did this I’d bury them too.”

Jeremy Lillies, of the Royal British Legion, added: “It is distressing.”

The Sun’s Military Adviser Major-General Perkins said: “It is despicable.”

Appalled local MP Jacques Lang said: “It is an attack on the memory of the British and American soldiers who contributed to the liberation of our soil.”

Police captain Thibault Martin added: “It is sick and cowardly.”

The shocking news comes as a new poll reveals that a third of the French want SADDAM to win the war.[Their Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin had to "sleep on it" overnight before he could answer affirmatively that "France" indeed wanted Coalition forces to prevail over Saddam.--J.T.]

A massive 78 per cent of 1,000 people in the poll by French newspaper Le Monde disapproved of the Allied action.

But 16 per cent “really wish for” a Coalition victory — while 37 per cent said they would prefer one.
When a U.S. Congresswoman proposed a bill giving families of those killed in war the option of having their loved ones bodies moved from French cemeteries back to America, I thought it was going a bit far.
Now, I'm not so sure.
If I had a relative buried over there and thought their final resting place would be desecrated like these, I'd give it real thought, especially now that we find out that the feelings of animosity may be mutual.
(In the past week, the French have defaced a fascimile of the Statue of Liberty using red paint to show her "crying" (blood?) and have smashed a bronze plaque that was dedicated to the 9/11 victims. Bad signs.)
These French vandals were only going one step further than their elders and their "betters" like Monsieur le President Jacques Chirac in their lack of respect for Britain and America, our contribution to liberating their country twice and the price of Anglo-American friendship for decades, if not centuries.
There is a deep sickness in France and I'm not quite sure what it is, why it exists, or what it means, but it's scaring the dickens out of me!
I don't think anyone's grave should be desecrated for any reason, much less for the reason of contemporary politics.
This deed was done was by sociopathic personalities who have zero respect for others, living or deceased.
Today, it's the graves of war dead who died for a cause (and Britain, especially, was thought to have lost almost a whole generation of young men in WWI).
Tomorrow, who knows?
It doesn't bear thinking about, that's for sure.