[mtphil]

You've missed the point entirely in your rush to assuage yourself that France isn't "uniquely" evil. I never did nor did I ever mean to insinuate that France is somehow unique or uniquely awful in its colonial history. Most colonial histories are horrific to discover. All I did was insist that acknowledging this history is the first step in engaging with France's historical past in good faith.

France's colonial history was appalling, as were many if not all colonial histories, but the article at the heart of this thread was about France's particular postcolonial history in Rwanda, not about other colonial or postcolonial situations involving other countries. And my original response was to contradict someone trying to flatly deny any French culpability whatsoever in the atrocities committed in Rwanda in the 90s. Whatever you're trying to do here with "well sure France was a horrific colonial overlord but so were X, Y and Z" is completely beside the point.