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Tuesday, May 27, 2003
posted by gbarto at 12:41 AM:
A Dog's Life has two nice items on France abroad. It seems their attempts to rival the US have not gone well for them, nor reflected well upon them.I would say that France's problem is the same that Bob Dole had with Bill Clinton in '96. Whatever he's for, I'm against, is not an agenda, not a plan, not an outlook. It's not even much of a policy. In defining itself against the US, France blew it, because it could never be sure what it stood for until the US had taken a position, hence the confusion over what UN Res 1441 was supposed to do. France felt, plain and simple, that it would give France leverage over the US. But to do... what? To protect Hussein? To protect TotalFinaElf? Or just to spite the US? Their decision to contain the US for the sake of proving France was a player created a situation in which we set the direction of the debate and determined the stakes. In the end, we embarrassed the source of France's reputed power, showed France powerless, and continue to make things miserable for a country shouting to be noticed. But once Paris took its decisions, its only way to live up to its declared intention to contain us was to send troops to Iraq to defend Hussein... and actually defeat us. Considering that Chirac's support came from youth desiring, perhaps, the neutralization of the US, but especially that they not get dragged into a war, this meant that Paris had to bow out. Which is why Le Monde fronts it if Chirac gets to talk to Bush for five minutes while the White House issues a statement which barely stops short of denying a call took place. Of course, much to France's chagrin, this leaves it trapped the same place it was before: George Bush does what George Bush does while Chirac, again, tries to prove he's powerful by the way France stacks up against the US, since he cannot point to what it stands for or makes happen on its own.
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