Includes bibliographical references (pages 263-340) and index.
Contents
Romance -- Soldier, liberator, tourist -- The myth of the manly GI -- Masters in their house -- Prostitution -- Amerilots and harlots -- The silver foxhole -- Dangerous indiscretions -- Rape -- The innocent suffer -- Black terror on the bocage -- Conclusion: two victory days.
Summary
How do you convince men to charge across heavily mined beaches into deadly machine-gun fire? If you're the US Army in 1944, one of your approaches is dangling the lure of beautiful French women, ready to reward their liberators in oh so many ways. Roberts tells the troubling story of how the US military command exploited the myth of French women as sexually experienced and available. The resulting sexual predation, and the blithe response of the American military leadership, caused serious friction between the two nations just as they were attempting to settle questions of long-term control over the liberated territories and the restoration of French sovereignty.
