The war hits home

But later that night, alone in his tiny apartment, the great-grandfather of six is filled with a deep sense of sadness. Images of destroyed lives and destroyed cities after the German bombardments when he was a young man flood his memory. "I feel so sad and concerned for the Iraqis, the Americans and for all of us," he says. "I think the Western world is making a grave mistake."

For months, the outspoken Mr. Corbasson had been debating the pros and cons of what he calls an "illegal and immoral" war with his friends. He poured out his anger against the American president in vehement letters to local newspapers, all of which went unpublished. Equally futile had been his attempts to persuade his son, Neil, who works for a French company in Dubai, that this war is "complete madness."

Neil, who sees a threat Saddam Hussein poses to Iraq's neighbors in the region, is among only about 17 percent of the French population who backs Bush in his efforts to rid the world of the Iraqi leader.

"I tried to talk to him about it, but it doesn't work on the phone," says the disappointed father. "I will see him when he comes to France next week. Maybe I can talk to him again then."

For the former Marine, who took part in the Allied landing in Normandy in 1944 with General Charles De Gaulle, this war flies in the face of everything he'd fought for all his life.

"We are not barbarians anymore," Corbasson says. "We are civilized people. We created the United Nations so there could be peace in the world." This war is illegal, he says, because Bush doesn't have the full backing of the UN. The only way a war could have been justified, he adds, is if Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein had directly attacked America.

Apart from the legality issue, he says, there's also a moral problem. "In the last Gulf war [in which France was a member of the US-led coalition] we killed thousands of Iraqi civilians," he says. "It was not a war, it was a massacre... But at least in that war "we were right" because Kuwait had been attacked."

Even though he quit the military after the war and became a successful financial adviser for companies across the world, it's clear that in his heart, Corbasson will always be a soldier.

He speaks proudly of the "clean war" he fought in - and the "13 German ships I sank," for which he was highly decorated - and speaks about the first Gulf war in 1991 as if he had been there. But this time, he clearly distances himself from what he describes as "a total catastrophe."

"If I were a soldier now and (French President Jacques) Chirac decided to help America, I would not have gone to war," he says determinedly.

As a French participant in the Marshall Plan negotiations in Washington after World War II, Corbasson readily admits that France is indebted to the US. "It means we have to help America as much as we can if they are attacked," he says, "but it doesn't mean we must run after them when they start a stupid war without reason," he says.

Along with many of his countrymen, the self-described "French patriot" speculates that the war has mostly to do with Bush's failure to capture Osama bin Laden, America's Middle East oil interests, and Bush's desire to succeed "where daddy had failed."

"I don't hate America," Corbasson said. "I love America. I lived there for three years. It's sad that the American government is telling its people to hate us. But in the long term they will come to respect Chirac."

Saturday morning, as France wakes up to the news of devastating air assaults on Baghdad, Corbasson is again blissfully unaware that the war has taken on a new dimension. Only in discussion with his friends before morning mass does he begin to grasp the extent of the US's "shock and awe" air campaign. For the first time, the former military man sounds defeated. "It's inhuman. We couldn't stop it. We're back to the law of the jungle. It's awful. What more can I say?"

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