France’s determined opposition to Washington’s attempts to steer the UN into an attack on Iraq has given it an international standing that it has not enjoyed for many a year. It has come to be seen as the leader of the global anti-war movement, more so than even Russia and China. Proof of that was the unprecedented round of applause for French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin’s anti-war speech at the UN last week.
For that reason, President Jacques Chirac’s outburst at central and eastern European governments such as Poland and the Czech Republic for daring to take the US point of view is astpounding. To threaten doing so might endanger their applications to join the EU could undermine the very policy that Chirac champions.
To ridicule them publicly, saying that they have not behaved properly and have missed an historic opportunity to keep quiet, is hardly the way to make friends and influence people. This is the same blustering, steamroller approach that the White House has used to such damaging effect on the world stage. President Bush’s “either you’re with us or against us” statement, his arrogant assumption that Washington knows best and that everyone else has to fall into line behind it have done more to alienate international public opinion than the evident bellicosity of his Iraqi policy; other governments are not going to be told what to do by Washington. It is incredible then that Chirac should try to do the same on a European stage. All Chirac has done is to exacerbate anti-French feeling in Europe. The result will not be European governments falling into line behind France on Iraq, but the opposite. Indeed, from the furor it has created in Eastern Europe, that is already happening.
The French position on Iraq is not only 100 percent right, it is clearly in tune with European public opinion; the demonstrations across Europe last Saturday prove that. It is quite understandable then that Chirac and his government should feel exasperated with other European governments who do not see the issue as they do. But bullying is not going to win converts. What makes his outburst even less comprehensible is that Eastern European support for US is hardly of major importance in the first place. If, apart from the UK and Australia, the only support that George Bush can find is from places such as Latvia and Slovakia, his case is not exactly strengthened.
With Europe so divided on Iraq, what is needed is calm, intelligent diplomacy to convince those who would support Bush’s war that such adventurism is dangerous. What is not needed is petulance and threats from the very man whose job it is. President Chirac may be frustrated that he is not getting his way with other European leaders, but that is neither reason nor excuse for such bad behavior. He should have known better than to make the same foolish mistake as George Bush, to try and crack the whip and force everyone into line. It was a blunder. All he has done is infuriate the Central and East Europeans, making them and the existing members of the EU who support the Bush line even more determined to stick to it.
It is not the Eastern Europeans who have missed an opportunity to keep silent; rather it is Chirac. France has earned itself the respect of much of the world because of its stand against the US over Iraq. This is not the time to throw it away. The cause is far too important.
