I've been reading the spring 2005 issue of the National Interest and was particularly struck by the review of former Paris CIA station chief Charles Cogan's French Negotiating Behavior: Dealing With Le Grande Nationthat is probably well worth reading on its own right, as is the very revealing profile of Sarkozy.
This tidbit was particularly interesting:
Cogan gives a masterly summary of this last crisis, citing French sources to note that a French general was in the Pentagon in December of 2002, declaring that 15,000 French troops and 100 warplanes would be available in the event of war. And on January 7, 2003, speaking at the Ecole Militaire, President Chirac told his troops to prepare for action.
So, what has been hailed in France as the "revelation" in the Bob Woodward-style book, Chirac contre Bush--that Chirac was quite prepared to go to war and had prepared the French army to fight in Iraq--is not so new after all.
I myself have noted Chirac's Ecole Militaire speech before (I believe it was in a debate with WoC commenter Andrew J. Lazarus) as evidence that France, generally recognized as the most anti-war of the Western European states, was prepared to assist the US in Iraq. However, as the reviewer notes, something changed between January 7 and January 20, 2003, though we don't get a clear idea of what exactly that "something" was.
French officials now say that it was partly the reflex decision to adopt a "European position" by supporting the anti-war stance of German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder. The current French ambassador to the United States, Jean-David Levitte, took a high-minded line in a lecture at MIT: "If this were not a matter of principle, don't you think we would have jumped on the bandwagon of war?" Miller and Molesky cite Richard Holbrooke saying that it was routine French brinkmanship: "The classic play out of the Charles de Gaulle playbook; hold out to the end, get more leverage."
"We refused to establish a link between the terrorist networks and the Iraqi regime, and in the absence of a prospect of peace in the Middle East, we feared that violence in Iraq would only intensify the resentment and anger", is one part of Villepin's explanation in The Shark and The Seagull. France could simply not go along with the broad approach of the Bush Administration to the Arab world. Villepin goes on:
"But the misunderstandings proceeded less from such recent events than from much deeper historical roots. Against France, heir of the pragmatism of Cardinal Richelieu, supporter of a system of interstate relations based on custom, on the transaction and exploitation of national interests, the United States affirmed its power and refused to share it. For the Americans, any agreement would be seen in one way or another as a compromise. In the concert of nations, the United States saw its place only as conducting the orchestra."
Chirac contre Bush has the French president in that crucial two-week period recalling his days as a young officer in the doomed war to keep Algeria French and what he saw as the new danger of the Iraq War unleashing a clash of civilizations with Islam. Something else that lay heavily on Chirac's mind was the new Bush Doctrine that justified preventive war and the heady rhetoric from Washington of "regime change" in Iraq as part of a broader ambition to democratize the Middle East.
"If we want to intervene in order to change countries' political systems, then we're in another civilization", Chirac told the New York Times in an interview on September 8, 2002.
If I understand Villepin's argument, France didn't see a link between Iraq and al-Qaeda and feared that the violence in Iraq would spiral outward in the absence of a settlement for the Israeli-Palestinian population, while Chirac feared that Bush saw Iraq as part of a series of military adventures to establish democracy in the Middle East. These are all reasonable arguments to oppose the Iraq war in so far as they go, but there's one problem with them: nothing changed on any of those fronts from January 7 and January 20, so why did French policy?
This is one of the reasons (largely academic at this point, given that we just passed the second anniversary of the fall of Baghdad) why I'm not nearly as eager as some to draw the conclusion that the failure to find WMDs somehow retroactively legitimized the French anti-war position - I still don't know why France took the position it did. Near as I can tell, and books like Cogan's make this quite clear, the French position was not based on any new intelligence they received during that period, but something caused them to do a complete 180 on Iraq to the point of actively lobbying Turkey to prevent the passage of US troops through their territory and planning to veto a second UN resolution on the subject of Iraq. It is a strange day indeed where the US can persuade Pakistan, whose government presumably had a lot more to lose than Chirac's, to support the war in Iraq but not one of our oldest European allies.
Any thoughts?
The U.S. should not have intervened to change a government on June 6, 1944. It's a matter of principle.
Yeah, JC belatedly realized his gravy train could get cut off, and the records of the gravy shipments would be exposed. So he started with the merde, which he can shovel like a Hercules.
I suspect the French military logistics people informed Chirac that they simply couldn't project that sort of force into Iraq in any sort of timely and ordered fashion. France can move a couple of thousand relatively lightly armed troops into what is more or less their back yard. Beyond that it gets challenging. The have neither the airlift nor the sealift capacity to get the job done, and no longer can provide independent sea-based force protection for their own people.
Rather than make such a damaging admission, the decision was taken to oppose the campaign on "principle," all in the name of European solidarity, of course.
And/or it was also a typical French ruse, pretending they were on our side and expecting that the UN et al. could moot the issue for them. When that turned out to be an unrealistic expectation, they had to pull the plug.
That my be in part because they were more concerned about their own domestic "Arab street," than that in the Middle East.
There is so much going wrong in France these days that it is entirely possible the Fifth Republic will not survive to see its 50th anniversary in 2008.
Wild, conspiracy theory-bordering guess is that they were seriously blackmailed. Probably got a credible threat of a major terror attack or, maybe, a big oil embargo. Or both. An attack on a French tanker was in October 2002, and it demonstrated that French oil shipment was in jeopardy. Ricin in London and Manchester was found in January 2003. French police also found ricin, but they didn't told exactly when and how the attack was planned.
My understanding is that Bart Hall's assessment of France's ability to project force strength is correct.
It's hard for a non-specialist like me (at any rate) to separate out France's various motives when dealing with the US in particular. However, several interesting events after the time in question might shed some light on their turnaround.
One of these has been an on-again, off-again common law marriage with Germany. Remember when French and German officials were sitting in for one another at EU and other functions?
The ricin discoveries were interesting in part for how quickly they disappeared from public discussion and followup.
But while the situation in the immigrant ghettos is a serious political consideration for French leaders, I wonder if the turnaround wasn't primarily triggered by oil contract promises from Saddam. Remember how angry Russia was to find out that Total had been promised huge contracts at favorable prices if the sanctions were removed, to the detriment of Russia's understanding of its own contractual options?
I don't have time to look up links to back up / verify those memories .... should do it later, or maybe someone else can contribute.
Oil-for-Food. If that onio is ever peel eough, I expect the answer will be found there. Money derived from OfF passed thru a series of cutouts to someone close to Chirac during that period. Enough money to buy a strong recommendation to Chirac. Perhaps paired with a threat of blackmail or ...
I've been saying this for some time: if you want to understand French policy over Iraq the answer's in Berlin, not Baghdad.
I don't think 'oil-for-food', oil concessions, arms deals etc. were as significant as some people think. It may have swayed some, but if that had been critical France could have been bought off. And you could have bet they'd have asked, and that the UK FO would have backed it. A deal would have been done, I suspect.
As for fear of French Muslim reaction, I don't believe that for a moment. Nor that some sort of "Eurabian" grand strategy was motivating the French elite.
On military logistics, I'll defer to experts. But I would observe that sea protection was hardly an issue. And if Turkey had come on board rail transit would have been available for a lot of the way.
Walker refers to a "...reflex decision to adopt a "European position" by supporting the anti-war stance of German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder."
I'd agree Schroder was crucial; but I doubt there was much unthinking reflex in the French reaction to it.
Rather, the French political/diplomatic leadership saw in Schroder's policy, and the political dynamics behind it, a major opening for one of the prime objectives of French foreign policy from the 1960's, and especially since 1989: driving a wedge between the US and Germany.
I suspect that is also the reason driving the otherwise senseless repeated picking of quarrels by France over Iraq-related issues since: to keep the rift open between Berlin and Washington. France wants to make the split permanent; for Paris the ideal oucome would be the complete collapse of NATO.
All of these answers are correct. The real question is why would anyone think France would ever have actually followed through? It was against so many of their perceived interest to support us, it would have been utterly out of character had they done so. Thats fine. But the way they actively opposed us and de facto defended the Hussein regime to the bitter end is the problem.
Any records of a meeting between Chirac and the CEO of Total during that time? At pre-war oil prices, Chirac would have been presented with $650 BILLION reasons to change his stance and try to keep Saddam in power to preserve Total's oil contracts in the South. Chirac may have discovered that his country's contribution to the Iraq endeavor would NOT be rewarded with exclusive oil contracts and therefore opted to preserve the status quo.
The French economy relies on exploiting markets where the United States is absent or underrepresented, usually because of sanctions (China, Iraq, Iran, Syria, etc). Presumably Chirac was reminded of this, although as a life-long bureaucrat familiar with the French absolute advantage, he should have known about this. French foreign policy must always be evaluated in terms of economics, with oil the principle sub-factor.
The Franco-German alliance in the pre-war build-up may be something worth considering. Remember that it was the BND (German Intel) that produced the reports of mobile chemical weapons labs and three-year time-frame for nuclear weapons in Iraq in the build-up to the invasion of Iraq.
Having said that, I don't think France was ever going to proceed with any plan of regime change in Iraq.
Mark Buehner:
Antagonising the US by open opposition - not only up to the invasion but niggling about various issues since - is the whole point, so long as relations between the US and Germany are damaged.
Jeff, American products are mostly crap. The products France products rarely compete with American.
The article quotes from de Villepin are interesting.
Is it more amusing (or alarming, depending on your mood) to think that he is daft enough to believe this, and yet become Foreign Minister and a potential future president, or that he is cynically shovelling b-s and expecting his French readership to find it credible?
"...France, heir of the pragmatism of Cardinal Richelieu, supporter of a system of interstate relations based on custom..." ROFLMAO. And lets not even start on Napoleon.
And France should be like a seagull?
The obvious joke regarding Villepiniste policy: Flaps around, squawks a lot, and then craps on your head :)
As I said earlier, French policies have a clear basis in strategic objectives held since the Suez debacle and the return to power of de Gaulle. But the clumsiness, irresponsibility and lack of broader strategic realism with which Chirac and de Villepin have pursued them would leave de Gaulle in despair.
My thoughts as follows: The French are a bunch of 'suivistes'. The public, the media, the establishment will 'rally around the flag' if the government declares a foreign policy action in the national interest. If Chirac had supported action in Iraq, the media and the others would have followed suit.
A good illustration is the article in leftist daily liberation on December 22 entitled "France commits itself to the war path":
"France has set out on the path of war with Irak. The National Navy announced on Friday that the nuclear powered aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle would be ready to take to the sea by the end of January. This is the first tangible sign of a potential military engagement by France alongside the Americans...The Charles de Gaulle carrier was to undergo six months of maintenance... This has been cancelled. 'We want to be ready' explained Admiral Jean-Louis Battet...Faced with the threat of the use of chemical weapons, taken very seriously by the military command, the army has only limited protection capacities..."
La France s'engage sur le sentier de la guerre avec l'Irak. La Marine nationale a annoncé, vendredi, que le porte-avions nucléaire Charles-de-Gaulle sera «disponible à l'appareillage» fin janvier. C'est le premier signe concret d'un éventuel engagement militaire de la France aux côtés des Américains. La fin janvier correspond à la publication du rapport des inspecteurs de l'ONU, prévue à la date du 27. En cas de conclusions négatives pour l'Irak, le président Chirac pourrait, par exemple, annoncer aussitôt l'envoi du porte-avions dans le Golfe. Le Charles-de-Gaulle devait entamer début 2003 une période d'entretien de six mois à l'arsenal de Toulon. Elle vient d'être annulée. «On veut être prêt», a expliqué, vendredi, le chef d'état-major de la Marine, l'amiral Jean-Louis Battet, lors d'une rencontre avec la presse...
Face à la menace d'emploi d'armes chimiques et biologiques prise très au sérieux à l'état-major , l'armée de terre ne dispose que de capacités limitées de protection et surtout de décontamination des soldats. Si elle le décidait, la France aurait ainsi bien du mal à déployer en toute sécurité plus de 5 000 soldats sur le champ de bataille. Le porte-avions Charles-de-Gaulle, lui, sera au large.
What is interesting here is the bland, hohum tone in which Liberation announces that France is preparing for war, the government has given instructions for the aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle to be ready by late January, and the French military is taking seriously the risk of chemical weapons attacks and preparing its forces for such an eventuality. Ditto Le Monde's resumé of March 26:
"On December 20, [French military authorities] that the Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier would be ready by the end of January ... On 7 January ... Chirac asked the French military personnel to 'be prepared for any eventuality' ... General Henri Bentegeat, stated that "everything appears to be pointing to a major mobilization in 2003'. On both sides of the Atlantic, these remarks are immediately seen as a movement in favor of support for the war.
"Le 20 décembre, ils annoncent que le porte-avions Charles-de-Gaulle sera prêt fin janvier à partir en tournée. Le 7 janvier, dans ses vœux aux armées, Jacques Chirac demande aux militaires français de "se tenir prêts à toute éventualité" en 2003 ; juste avant lui, le chef d'état-major des armées, le général Henri Bentegeat, affirme que "tout semble se conjuguer pour que les armées soient encore fortement mobilisées en 2003". Des deux côtés de l'Atlantique, ces commentaires sont aussitôt interprétés comme une inflexion en faveur d'un soutien à la guerre."
Even the Communist Party daily L'Humanité (Dec 2002) was resigned to the possibility of French participation and voiced only muted criticism:
"Still, with his statement, the President added to the tension in an already difficult situation. He acknowledges that war seem inevitable and declares that France will not oppose a potential opening of hostilities and will participate alongside the USA. A change of political position. Up to now, the French position was aimed more at seeking a political solution"
Pourtant, avec sa déclaration, le chef de l'État contribue à tendre une situation déjà difficile. Il admet que la guerre semble inéluctable, annonce que la France ne s'opposera pas à un éventuel déclenchement des hostilités et qu'elle y participera au côté des USA. Un virage politique. Jusqu'à présent la position française était plutôt la recherche d'une solution politique.
A radical shift in establishment and public opinion from France's 'inevitable' joining alongside the Americans occurred within a matter of days. Suddently, it was hysterical opposition to the American 'imperialist' war 'for oil' as reported in the ensuing weeks in the French media (even up to this day), echoed by government officials, and reflected in public opinion. 1940 all over again.
Leaving aside the question of why France seems to have changed its position for strategic or other reasons, this is a fascinating sociological study. Marcel Ophuls would be impressed.
Gabriel Gonzalez
Yeah, I noticed the shift as well.
Still would like to know more about why this shift occurred ...
They were not preparing for war. They were preparing for Saddam to allow a large number of peace keepers (50.000 or so) to controle if he really had destroyed all his WMD programs and weapons. The rumors are that he even gave permission to it but that the US didn't want that.
There is no basis for that conclusion, a. The preparations were not consistent with that role.
Had the American plan been to topple Hussein's regime and put a cap onto any WMD programs, perhaps even leave some troops garrisoned there outside of cities; then I believe France would have followed.
This would have essentially left the Sunni power structure (and army) in place [same government, new leader(s)], a condition that fit France's political objective of stability over democracy. Plus, France had extensive ties within that structure which it could exploit. Furthermore, in the year running up to the war, a couple of French firms were awarded [overly] generous oil contracts that would likely have been honored had the major parts of the Sunni power structure been preserved. Thus, there was an economic element too it. Furthermore, such an invasion/occupation plan carries far less of a chance for insurgency from those who lost out in power. Sure, the Shi'ites may rebel, but the existing Sunni power structure had experience in quelling that.
However, if the goal of the invasion becomes one of completely obliterating the existing political structure (along with anything attached to the former [like oil contracts]); it becomes harder and harder to find an upside for France.
In that case, France who always looks out for herself first, must find another way to get an advantage. So, IMHO, either Chirac become aware of true nature of the American invasion, decided he could not effect its nature, or finally found an alternative; sometime in those two weeks in early 2003. Perhaps some lobbying by Schroeder did the trick.
As an aside, a few Arabs I know and atleast one frenchman I spoke with, fully expected the type of invasion I outlined, one leaving the old power structure intact. Thus, as soon as the regime was toppled they suggested moving the troops out of the city, out of sight; and were perplexed by the disbanding of the Iraqi Army. However, to fully dismantle the old regime, the Iraqi Army had to be dismantled (ht to Zeyad of Healing Iraq to cluing me into that).
All interesting and valid points as to why the French backed out. One that has yet to be mentioned is the fact that Chirac is desperate to stay in power as he faces criminal indictment as soon as he leaves office. A war with Iraq was very unpopular with the French people and could have cost Chirac his position of protection. When it comes to politicians, never overlook their own personal gain and survival.
Mix it all together and you get a recipe for deception.
#17
Do you have any idea how negotiations work?
They had to so force to make the treat real but that doesn't mean that you are planning to follow up on them
#19
Chirac has fought in Algeria which could have been a very important reason not to fight.
#18
_ one leaving the old power structure intact._
Why invade? This could have been done without an invasion. You also have to remember that after the summer the Shiite would have rebeled and it is very hard to subdue them will claiming that you are there to liberate them. That is also why the Americans caved in to Sistani after only one or two demonstrations (other than the fact that the British would have left)
France is essentially a sheep looking for wolves clothing. Sort of a one line summation of Kojeve's Latin Empire thesis. January 2003 was a heady time. French/German cooperation was close, but Paris saw an opportunity to make it closer. Around this time, I believe, De Villepin floated the idea of joint parliaments, and other co-mingling of powers, between France and Germany. Sort of a formalization of the (now sputtering) Franco-German "engine" of European integration. With protest on the street, my calculation is that Chirac saw an opportunity to:
1. Imprint the French-German social model permanently on Europe (d'Estaing's Constitution)
2. Marginalize Blair and settle the Locke/Rousseau argument on the Continent.
3. Create that "counterweight" to the Ami "cultural virus", a long held dream of Chuck from Gaul retreads.
He gambled on the "Euro Street" and lost.
The answer to what happened between the 7th and 20th of January lie within the minutia of continental politics.
Jeff (#10)
The French economy relies on exploiting markets where the United States is absent or underrepresented, usually because of sanctions (China, Iraq, Iran, Syria, etc).
and now that Iraq is no longer in the club, Venezuela?
Another Scott (#18)
I agree. The French government wanted only a change of the dictator plus some democratic reforms, but not a full revamp of the Iraqi governing structures. Once it was clear this was the aim of America, they backed.
a (#20)
Chirac has fought in Algeria which could have been a very important reason not to fight.
That was no worry! France only looses its wars when it fights alone. Moreover, Chirac himself sold two nuclear reactors to Saddam in the early 80's. They knew each other.
Why invade?
That's not easy to be explained to an European. It was necessary to set up an entire new governing system not rooted in Baathism, that is, a kind of National Socialism, but in freedom. The Americans have done the right thing.
but not a full revamp of the Iraqi governing structures.
The Iraqi governing structures were not perfect but quite good when you would add some democracy. It is a whole lot better that the Americans had in mind. (One of the coalition of the "willing" nationalized its nation oil and gas company and the US wanted to do the reverse)
France only looses its wars when it fights alone
Like Vietnam?
The Americans have done the right thing.
Freedom to oppress women. If America wanted a free Iraq they would have behaved differently
I don't think the French were ever in the fight.
The machinations of firing up their logistics chain only to shut it down a few days later was simply a tactical exercise to give them a back door if their strategic focus (overt efforts against American foreign policy) failed.
Well, their strategic endeavour failed. In order to gain the good graces of the victor, you wait a reasonable length of time and then spin the story that you were always ready to go. "For some unknown reason our preparations were called off."
Very typical french. I don't expect this tactic will fool anyone.
Victor? I find the situation the US is in better than i expected and it is obvious that the US has lost the war in Iraq. I assume that the French have made the same calculation as i did in 2003. In a decade Iraqi childern will learn how their country was invaded by the "evil" US and as such it would be dumb to be associated with the invasion.
"It is a strange day indeed where the US can persuade Pakistan, whose government presumably had a lot more to lose than Chirac's, to support the war in Iraq but not one of our oldest European allies."
Very funny. Where did you get the idea that France is an American ally?
Joe, this is the first of two (so far) articles pinting out that up to January 7, france was not only amenable to the U.S. invasion of iraq, but was planning to contributre a full division of french troops to the ofpertion. Between then and 1/21/03 SOMETHING HAPPENED. The two articles, and all of the comments, explore what the something could have been.
Lovingkindness,
Sid Cochran
Wrong : Chirac knew he could not stop Bush, only show off and be the leader of anti-war states and peoples. So there's no point about oil contract and business. About the military, France fought (lightly) in Iraq 1991, and since, professionalization made projection less troublesome (event though participation would have been marginal). It is said french military wanted to go and fight war, as the British would do (same as 1991). Germany followed France, not the other way. If France said yes, Germany would have shut up. Germany, Russia and China at some point stood up because France was protecting them. "Forgive Russia, ignore Germany, blame France" wasn't it the quote ? and everybody knew France would be blamed.
Then why ? International law and principles, ok, it was the same for the Gulf war, but Bush father was clever enough to negociate and obtain UN support (so france too). French arab diplomacy, ok at some point. French public opinion, as Chirac is quite populist. And pride too, being the country leading the global anti-war movement. And actually, France ws right about no WMD, no Saddam-Ben Laden links, civil war, increasing terrorism, etc. It doesn't explain why they said no, but it was right still.
The question is what caused the change in january. National political issues, W. Bush diplomatic rigidity, UN inspections "success". I'm doind academic research on that issue and try to tell you in months or years.