That is a misperception, Rap, and a very common one. It is based on quite recent history. France has won a great many wars and battles in its entire history as a nation...more, in fact, than it has lost, but it has not done so well in more recent times (since the rise of modern Germany, a nation with a greater population and industrial strength than France). The Germans defeated the French handily in the Franco-Prussian War. The French, English, and Americans, however, prevailed against the Germans in WWI (the Germans this time being outnumbered themselves in both men and resources). No one can fault French courage in either of those conflicts, but in both cases it was the side with greater material and human resources which won out in the end.

In most of the 1800s the French were seen as having the most effective army in the world. Americans greatly admired the French Army in that century, and wished to emulate it...hence the Zouaves who dressed in quasi-French uniforms during the American Civil War.

It has only really been since France's rapid defeat in 1940 that they have been labelled as poor fighters and military "losers" by Americans. This isn't fair or balanced at all. The fact is, ANY western army in existence would have been rapidly defeated in a land campaign by the stunning new German tactics in 1940. If the British had not had the English Channel to protect them, the Germans would have conquered them too, and just as quickly as they did the French. As for the Russians, they were defeated in similar fashion...repeatedly...until the incredible vastness of their homeland itself and the severity of their winter stretched German resources and supply lines to the breaking point....the same fate Napoleon met when he went to Russia.

This common cliche' of deriding French courage on the field of battle is utter nonsense, and it is not supported by the historical facts.