I am wondering if anyone (probably a general after WWII said something
like "I would rather have the Germans in front of me than the French
behind me," meaning that it is easier to defeat the Germans than to be
defended by the French.

Hello.

General George S. Patton is generally credited with saying that.

See Monday's edition of the Washington Times::
"...Gen. George Patton is reported to have said: 'I'd rather have a
German division in front of me than a French division behind me.'"
Source: Washingtontimes.com
http://washingtontimes.com/commentary/20030312-12894292.htm

The phrase, nearly always credited to Patton, is on several dozen web
sites. See the results of this Google Search:
://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1&client=googlet&scoring=d&q=%22german+division+in+front%22+french+behind&btnG=Google+Search

search strategy: "rather have", germans, german, ahead, french "behind
me"

I hope this helps.

You might want to read the following discussion about this topic
http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&safe=off&threadm=3e8f4cc0.2732036%40news.pacific.net.au&rnum=1&prev=/groups%3Fhl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26oe%3DUTF-8%26safe%3Doff%26selm%3D3e8f4cc0.2732036%2540news.pacific.net.au

It suggests that Patton did not in fact say this.  And if anything he
quite liked the French.

Thanks, Popsracer.

Very often, quotations are wrongly attributed to famous people.
There's even a book on the subject called "They Never Said It."
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0195055411/

It's unclear whether the Patton quote is real or fictional.  As my
answer indicates above, Patton is credited with saying it, though.