A flood of spunky replies has poured from East European countries in response to President Chirac's warning that opposing France by supporting US policy on Iraq mighty result in their being black-balled from the EU. A Latvian commentator was particularly pointed in his reply: "All right, Monsieur Chirac. Perhaps we are poor. Perhaps we were not raised properly. We do not know about fine wine and the various directions of avant-garde art. But we do not repay with ingratitude those who have helped us and who continue to help us." Ouch.
This notion of gratitude to those who have been helpful may well be foreign to the French character but they have seen it in action. When American forces came to the rescue of France in 1917, their leader General Pershing announced "Lafayette, we are here", a reference to the French aristocrat who had fought on the side of the American Revolution over a century before. Contrast that graciousness with the actions of another general, Charles de Gaulle, who repaid the tens of thousands of Canadians who died for French freedom by coming to Canada in 1967 and urging the separation of Quebec.
Perhaps the problem is linguistic. Is it significant that my English-French dictionary ("The Collins Pocket Reference") does not have an entry for a French translation of "ingratitude"? It does however contain terms for coward ("le lache") and appease ("apaiser", "calmer") and is loaded with words that mean surrender ("le reddition", "la capitulation", "se rendre", "capituler".) Such a rich language, French.