Talk:Francs-tireurs

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1 Merge
2 Recent anonymous addition
3 FTP-MOI is part of the French Resistance
4 Merged in from Talk:Franc-tireur
- 4.1 "Francs-tireurs" conflict
5 Communist prestige

[edit] Merge

Shouldn't this be "Franc-tireur", that is, singular rather than plural?

Someone has created a Franc-tireur page; they should be combined. A D Monroe III 01:39, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Oy. There's also a Francs-Tireurs et Partisans page! A D Monroe III 01:52, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Still not merged! I think this one should be the title, and I'll add merge notices accordingly and see how people react. Let's give this at least a week for reaction. -- Jmabel | Talk 06:24, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

These are different things:

The "Francs-tireurs" were an organisation of paramilitary forces during the 1870 war
A "franc-tireur" is basically a sniper (with an emphasis on the sneaking and paramilitary nature... you would not say that a regular military sniper using a Hecate II is a "franc-tireur"). Ant such soldier from any side, organisation of time can be thus qualified (for instance a Serbian sniper in Sarajevo would be a "franc-tireur" all right). I think that this entry would be more relevant in the French wikipedia than here.
The FTP-MOI were a Communist terrorist/resistant organisation during the Second world war. Rama 08:54, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

I have merged "Franc-tireur" into this article because this article was bigger, but it might be desirable to put in a WP:RM to move this article to the singular. I have no strong opinion on this either way. --Philip Baird Shearer 12:11, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Recent anonymous addition

There was a recent anonymous addition that is probably mostly OK, but has some issues; in general, it could use citations; a few points should be singled out:

"The francs-tireurs were often vilified by the German armies and popular press…": certainly true, but a citation would be nice.
"…seemed to the Germans to have an unerring sense of the most vulnerable parts of the German armies in France…" not at all self-evident, rather sweeping, and really calls for a citation.
"The experiences of French guerilla attacks and of asymmetric warfare in general during the War had a profound effect on the German General Staff, resulting in the unusually harsh and severe occupation of areas conquered by Germany during World War I." The claim of causality here also calls strongly for citation. -- Jmabel | Talk 01:55, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)

All this and more at The Franco-Prussian War - The German Invasion of France, Geoffrey Wawro. If you don't have access to the book, bits of it relating to francs-tireurs can be found here --61.88.82.134 05:48, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] FTP-MOI is part of the French Resistance

FTP-MOI is part of the French Resistance —This unsigned comment was added by 87.69.103.163 (talk • contribs) 28 March 2006.

[edit] Merged in from Talk:Franc-tireur

Copied from Talk:Franc-tireur when the pages were merged. --Philip Baird Shearer 12:11, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

I am not at all certain that this paragraph is correct: "It is not correct to say that international law allows unlawful combatants to be arbitrarily executed or otherwise punished. Rather, such persons are not covered at all by the rules of war, and they should instead be tried as civilians." Do you have a reference for this? I thought that fighters not covered by international law were "outside" both civilian and international law rules. It seems unlikely that such folks would get the "better" civilian protection if they were not entitled to the protection of international law. marvinfreeman

What do you mean by "better" civilian treatment? An armed person found shooting people would be considered a mass murderer as a civilian. Only if that person is a combatant following the laws of war will he be entitled to treatment as a prisoner of war, which implies the opposing belligrent may only intern the person for the duration of hostilities. /LK

By "better" I mean primarily the procedural safeguards mandated by the civilian law of their captors -- e.g. no unreasonable force during arrest, right to counsel, right to bail, some form of indictment and an opportunity to respond, a trial within a reasonable period of time, an impartial judge, etc. Nonetheless, I think I see what you are driving at. The article might leave the impression that unlawful combatants can be punished in any way the captor chooses. That is not correct. On the other hand, it is also incorrect to say that a franc-tireur must be tried as a civilian. The U.S. Supreme Court has not given unlawful combatants the right to a civilian trial. Maybe we need to leave out anything about punishment and just say that a franc-tireur need not be treated as a POW? We could let someone else cope with the rights of an unlawful combatant. As this article stands right now, the explanation/definition is decidedly circular. Someone who actually knows what this is should give a better explanation. Draco 03:40 Mar 23, 2003 (UTC)

[edit] "Francs-tireurs" conflict

Someone has created a Francs-tireurs page (plural rather than signular?); they should be combined. A D Monroe III 01:41, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Oy. There's also a Francs-Tireurs et Partisans page! All with the same info, sort of. Help, someone! A D Monroe III 18:32, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Communist prestige

I see that citation is requested for "the PCF's electoral success after World War II was, to a large extent, due to its prestige as a centre of resistance." I think this is clearly true, and Googling France Communist resistance prestige -wikipedia easily finds many claims to this effect. The issue is what is citable. [1] and [2] look very promising, if someone has JSTOR access to follow these up.

"the party… had long derived much prestige from its deep association with the Resistance and the Resistance myth" [3] from H-France Review tends to confirm what we say, but isn't exactly the same claim. By the way, both this last and the quotation from Maurice Buckmaster at [4] seem to question whether this association of the communists with the resistance was really legitimate.

A passage at [5] tends to bolster the statement. It's from a Marxist source, but not a CP source:

In France, the pro-fascist Vichy regime was discredited. The French resistance movement was under the control of the Communist Party. Prior to the liberation of Paris by the Allies, the resistance movement liberated the greater part of France, including Paris. The liberation committees almost everywhere became organs of power. The CP was the main force behind this rising, and once Vichy had collapsed France was convulsed in a revolutionary wave. The Anglo-American armies were faced with a fait accompli.

However, as soon as De Gaulle established a government he began to undermine the committees. Two representatives of the CP were rapidly drawn into the government, and despite their protests, De Gaulle signed a decree dissolving the militias. The General saw his task as to "trim the Communists' claws", with the eager cooperation of Thorez, the General Secretary of the CP. Thorez came out for law and order and the disbanding of the militias and all 'irregular' groups. Given the leading role of the Stalinists, the militias liquidated themselves into the French 'grand army'.

Hope that helps; if someone has JSTOR access, I suspect they may find the statement more explicitly. I would consider our statement a perfectly valid synthesis of what I've just found, but I know that some people feel that WP:NOR does not allow even this degree of synthesis, so I'm keeping this to the talk page for now. - Jmabel | Talk 20:22, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

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