How to play against the French?

Blast the French defense!  Blast it! 

I really need to know how to handle the white pawn structure and piece plans.  How do I play this position?  What are the typical white ideas? 

Help!!! I lose almost every time I play this as white. 

Possibly helpful:
A Simple Chess Opening Repertoire for White by Sam Collins

http://www.jeremysilman.com/shop/pc/A-Simple-Chess-Opening-Repertoire-for-White-76p3916.htm
http://www.gambitbooks.com/pdfs/A_Simple_Chess_Opening_Repertoire_for_White.pdf
My First Chess Opening Repertoire for White by Vincent Moret
https://www.newinchess.com/Shop/Images/Pdfs/9033.pdf

1.e4 vs. The French, Caro-Kann & Philidor By Parimarjan Negi

http://www.jeremysilman.com/shop/pc/1-e4-vs-The-French-Caro-Kann-Philidor-76p3875.htm

http://www.qualitychess.co.uk/ebooks/GMRep-1e4-vol1-excerpt.pdf

How to Beat the French Defence by Andreas Tzermiadianos (2008)

https://web.archive.org/web/20140627050257/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen115.pdf

Coming soon:

Playing 1.e4 - Sicilian & French by John Shaw

Hello,  I think you are getting White's plan mixed up and not understanding the idea of Black either. IN your first diagram, you advance to e5, giving you a large space advantage.... black immediately counterattacks with c5. Why do you think he has done this? He knows if he plays passively in this position he will slowly get crushed by White, so he decides to try to weaken your center. If d4 falls to Black, then white's position will collapse since he strong e5 pawn will all of the sudden become weak, and Black's pieces will open up naturally. The best move in the first diagram would then be 4. c3 . This move allows you to support your center, making it harder for Black to achieve his plans of undermining your center. If you could protect your center with moves like Be2, Nf3 and normal developing moves, then you might eventually relieve the pressure in an advantageous way for you. Always make sure in those positions as white to support your center and make black not be able to open up the positionn until it will be advantageous for YOU

4. f4 is quite bad.

Once, during a tournament in the chess club in our town, many years ago, I heard one player said: "If you as White play against French defense and you do not know at least one main line there, you can resign at once with an easy soul" :)

king's indian attack vs french seems like an easy and effective way to play against the french

This is what I play, and I have a lot of success, according to my chess.com database, I have a 67% win rate with it. And the chess.com master database has a 52% win rate. Not even counting the drawing percentage. I know that's not important, but IMO white's play is a lot easier than black's in this line of the Tarrasch. And you avoid all the theory Black probably had prepared against the mainline Tarrasch.

Anyways, it's up to you, just showing you a small portion of this opening. Furthermore, you will also sometimes face 3...c5 instead of 3... Nf6.

4.f4 in the Advance variation is too ambitious. In the advance Black is going to put a lot of pressure on d4 and White doesn't have time to play moves like f4 here. After the usual moves ...Nc6 and ...Qb6 White may be forced to play dxc5 in a position where it's not helpful.

In positions where White has played the move e5 and won a tempo by kicking the knight on f6 back there can be time to play a move like f4. Anyway I think advance structures can by tricky for White because sometimes Black forces ...Bb4+ Kf1 which isn't always a bad thing for White but is unnatural and can lead to middlegame blunders created by being unsure how to combine play in the center with keeping the White king safe.

So the best thing to do is to look at games between strong players in this line and learn from there. This is unfortunately not a position where you can just reinvent the wheel and White may have to do weird-looking things in these positions while Black is simply attacking pawns.

A simpler way to play is the really old 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.e5 c5 4.dxc5 Nc6 5.Nf3 which leads to what I think is called the "wedge structure" where White wants to try and cramp Black's game with the e5 pawn. And if Black is able to play ...f6 then it leads to a kind of hanging pawns game which you don't need any theory to play. You just need to be alert.

You should be well booked up before venturing 3.Nc3, because black has many ways of playing.

The advance and tarrasch are fine. The exchange is fine too if you don't mind the pawns being symmetrical. Other than the exchange variation, I think a low maintenance approach would be a KIA setup. There are a few tricks to be aware of, but that's it.

I prefer the exchange or KIA -- it's my lazy solution to the french 

As usual, pick an opening because you like the type of middlegame you reach, then look at a lot of GM games. Not because you'll understand or even remember the moves, but just to expose yourself to the usual ideas and patterns.

I used to play that. The 7...Be7 8.0-0 g5 line was really annoying to me though. It's not bad or anything, but I wasn't comfortable with it.

What about the 5.f4 Tarrasch line? Or the Steinitz? I don't think they're terrible.

You need a lot of theory for the advance but not 3.Nc3? What a joke

I just play the exchange. Nothing too complicated and you get similar positions often. I also say f4 sucks lol.

Before I pitch in my opinion on 3. Nc3 and 3. e5, allow me to just say that f4 sucks.

Now, Nc3 is a lot more theoretical than e5, but e5 brings a whole positional game that white should be aware of. I do think that white needs to be more prepared if he wants to play the Nc3 than e5, but what do I care? I play the Tarrasch.

It's true.

Sure if White goes ALL THE WAY to the poisoned pawn main line there's a lot of theory but it's not at all forced. First after 3...Bb4 White can try 7.h4, 7.a4 or 7.Nf3 rather than just going for the normal 7.Qg4. But even before then we must note that White can play Qg4 after 3...Bb4 on virtually every move. It's not always good but it's playable and gets those crazy positions without all that theory. In fact after 3...Bb4 4.Bd2!? de 5.Qg4 all White needs to remember is to make sure his queen doesn't get stuck after some ...Rg8, ...Rg4 thing. Players that like to play those ...Qc7 lines in the Winawer will especially be in trouble if they thought they'd never have to deal with Qg4 stuff.

After 3...Nf6 White can just play 4.Bg5 and then 4...de is a position he would've gotten anyway and 4...Be7 5.e5 Nd7 6.h4 puts the ball in White's court really. Black doesn't have to take or anything but it's still a lot less theory than other stuff.

And finally there's always just 3.Nc3 and 4.ed again just getting a game. I think Black is the one that really has to know his stuff better than White.

I have been playing the French a lot lately and have found that the Open Variation is the best for black especially if black is good at tactics. The open variation equalizes the position and gives black a fighting chance. This is certainly better than getting slowly crushed by white.  

How to play against the French.  Hmmm...bring some air freshener as they have bad BO.  And know they aren't as confident and cocky on the inside as they seem, especially if they are wearing brown, as there is a famous story related to that:

"The French officers captured a British officer and questioned him as to why their Officers all wear red uniforms.  'It is that so if I am injured, the blood will not show, and the soldiers under my command will not lose heart and panic.'  That is why from that day until now, the French army, WEARS BROWN!'