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Chirac's Big Choice
According to columnist Jim Hoagland, Jacques Chirac faces a decision that could shatter
the World War II era institutions - EU, NATO and the United Nations. Simply put, President Chirac could decide
that it was better to lead the weak than be ignored by the strong. Would a veto at the UN make France the official
leader of a constituency opposed to America's military might and global ambitions?
If so, what would that honor be worth?
Not much, if you look at the more subtle undercurrents working to isolate the French position. Jacque's buddies
seem to be fading away.
Looking at the mess France has created in the Ivory Coast, other former French African colonies react with alarm.
(What was the French unilateral solution to a threatened revolt? Put the Muslim rebels in charge of the ministries
of interior and defense in the elected Christian government's administration.) The Arab world has now by-passed
preventing a US invasion of Iraq and is concentrating on finding their place in the new reality. Saudi Arabia,
Turkey and Iran are vying for a voice in the new post Saddam government. China and Russia are getting more protective
of their relationship with America on the global scene. Even Germany is tiring of mending bridges only to have
France create more potholes. No one takes the UN seriously but the EU and NATO are a different matter.
Germany, in a quiet way, is giving the United States everything it would ask for in cooperation while loudly saying
they won't send ground troops. (No one wants or is asking for German ground troops.) Germany could have blocked
the transfer of the Turkish proposal for NATO defensive help to the Defense Planning Committee but did not do so.
France sacrificing NATO unity for UN posturing didn't set well with the Germans. Neither did the Chirac decidedly
undeft tirade at the Eastern bloc EU candidates who have as many votes as France and Germany combined.
France has made four errors which could prove fatal to their ambitions.
Unilateralism. France has asserted that it and Germany speak for Europe. Some 18 other European nations
have publicly stated that they do not. The French have thereby revived the old fears in Central Europe of being
crushed between Russia and Germany. Meanwhile, the wellspring of German power, its economy, hasn't created a private
sector job in ages. France proposes itself as the jockey but there is no horse to ride.
Moral Laxity. Alliances with Libya, Syria, Iran, Iraq and the like require anti-Semitic policies and practices
in order to gain commercial advantage. France has welcomed, not resisted, the violent strains of Islam either in
commerce or immigration. It tolerates sanctions that produce suffering for the Iraqi people and the tyrannical
rule of Saddam for money.
Elitism. France does not admit that elected EU representatives who disagree with them are as legitimate
as their own un-elected technocrats.
Appeasement. It takes two to disarm. Twelve years of delay and deception call for either a day of reckoning
or the creation of a situation where armed force is always "too early" until it's "too late."
Historically, appeasement gets people killed. (See WWII.)
France acts as though it still does not trust democracy. It appears fatally drawn to the totalitarianism of a self-defined
elite, whether in Brussels or Baghad.
As The Economist points out, it is the United States that possesses the world's oldest democracy. Our written
constitution was drafted in 1787. Our major political parties go back to 1828 and 1854. We know how to make freedom
work. France, on the other hand, has had five republics since 1789, plus several monarchies, one directory, a consulate,
a couple of empires and a collaborationist-fascist dictatorship which looks remarkably like the current government
of Iraq.
The trend in Europe is away from secular socialism. Inside the EU there are just three certified center-left governments.
Germany is as close to even in its electorate as possible. A free-market party is the second largest in Sweden.
Of the three, only the economic basket case Greece remains solidly socialist. Counting Britain, 9 out of 15 EU
countries are moving towards center-right governments. Anti-Americanism is a left-wing movement, not a European
movement. The 18 nations who sided with the US are from center-right governments most of them elected in the past
two years.
If Chirac leads the secular socialists further away from the market economy, the Continent may be headed for a
permanent second-class existence. One example is that Germany often prices itself out of the market through excessive
regulation. The precious French farm subsidy is already under attack at the WTO, for another. North American and
its Atlantic allies plus others such as Japan, China, Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea and even Russia grasp the
idea that market motivation creates energy and effort. Secular socialism cannot produce cradle-to-grave luxury.
It can't keep an aging population alive and healthy. It can't even produce new jobs and thereby create new wealth.
Within Europe, free trade zones and pro-market think tanks are springing up in response.
In a statist economy, political ties are paramount and essential to signing deals. France is Iraq's number one
trading partner and principal financier of the oil for food program. If today's Iraqi decision-makers are replaced
and French rolodexes become irrelevant, France fears it can be shut out of Iraq forever. In that case, its knee-jerk
anti-democratic capitalism emotions will cost France more than its place in history. It will cost France its future
as well. It's time for Jacques to decide.
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