France played a key role in American Revolutionary War
(American War of Independence; 1775–1783). Motivated by a long-term
rivalry with Britain and by revenge for its territorial losses during French and Indian War, France began secretly sending supplies in 1775.
By 1763, the French debt acquired to fight in the French and Indian War
came to a staggering 1.3 billion livres. It "set off France's own
fiscal crisis, in which a political brawl over taxation soon became one
of the reasons for French Revolution."[1]
France obtained its revenge against Britain, but materially it gained
little and its massive debt severely weakened the government and
escalated it towards French Revolution.[2]
The French goal in assisting the Americans was to weaken Britain and
to exact revenge for the defeat. In 1777, America captured the British
invasion army at Saratoga. In 1778, France recognized the United States
of America as a sovereign nation, signed a military alliance, and went
to war with Britain. France built coalitions with the Netherlands and
Spain, provided Americans with grants, arms and loans, sent a combat
army to serve under George Washington, and sent a navy that prevented the second British army from escaping from Yorktown in 1781.
Benjamin Franklin
served as the American ambassador to France from 1776 to 1785. He met
with many leading diplomats, aristocrats, intellectuals, scientists and
financiers. Franklin's image and writings caught the French imagination.
There were many images of Franklin being sold on the market, and he
became the cultural icon of the archetypal new American. Franklin even became a hero for a call for new order inside France.<span>[3]</span>