Good Bye Chirac

Just a recap of Chirac’s tenure in office… I will refrain from comment…

[quote]Few Americans will notice that Jacques Chirac is handing the reins of the French Republic to Nicolas Sarkozy this week. But they may come to notice—and appreciate—the difference in how the two leaders interact with Washington. Sarkozy won’t be America’s lapdog, but he’s bound to be an improvement over Chirac.

Largely because of France, it took eight weeks for the UN Security Council to agree in the fall of 2002 on a resolution requiring Iraq simply to comply with existing resolutions. Fearing he would “legitimize a preemptive use of force,” Chirac made sure not to explicitly authorize military action to bring Iraq into compliance. Instead, he forced the allies to go through the diplomatic dance twice—once to get Hans Blix and his hapless inspectors back into Iraq, and once to get the Security Council to confirm Blix’s findings and approve the war. As a result, the dance turned into a train wreck.

Even though a healthy majority of the European Union and virtually every leader in Eastern Europe supported a hard line against Baghdad, Chirac and his own lapdog in Germany opposed military action against Saddam Hussein. Perhaps it was Chirac’s old friendship with Saddam. As Slate’s Anne Appelbaum reminds us, Chirac once called Saddam, “my personal friend.” Or perhaps Chirac was protecting his cronies who were doing business with the Butcher of Baghdad. As Bill Gertz details in his book Treachery, French officials and French firms propped up Saddam throughout the 1990s and 2000s. Specifically, Gertz found that by 2000, France had become Iraq’s largest arms supplier. By 2003, Saddam had run up a tab with Paris of $4 billion for weaponry and non-military projects. (Some of that weaponry was even used against Coalition forces: A French-made missile downed a US A-10 in April 2003.)

Whatever the reason for Chirac’s intransigence, he was determined to prevent the US-led coalition from entering Iraq with the UN’s blessing. As the clock ticked down toward war, he threatened East European governments for daring to side with Washington rather than Paris on Iraq. “These countries are very rude and rather reckless of the danger of aligning themselves too quickly with the Americans,” he snarled. “Their situation is very delicate. If they wanted to diminish their chances of joining the EU, they couldn’t have chosen a better way.” (How’s that for diplomacy?)

Of course, military action was justified under 16 separate UN resolutions. If the biggest mistake President Bush and his advisors made after the fall of Saddam’s regime was not deploying more troops to smother sectarian violence, the biggest mistake they made before was going to the UN to be ensnared in Chirac’s labyrinth of diplomatic games.

The US and UK finally ended the games the second week of March 2003, citing a 173-page document published by UN inspectors. As an exasperated Tony Blair explained at the time, the report concluded that “550 mustard filled shells and up to 450 mustard filled aerial bombs [were] unaccounted for.” It expressed “additional uncertainty with respect of 6,526 aerial bombs, corresponding to approximately 1,000 tons of agent, predominantly mustard…Based on all the available evidence, the strong presumption is that about 10,000 liters of anthrax was not destroyed and may still exist.”

In short, Saddam was still noncompliant with UN demands. Whatever his motivation for being coy about the very stuff that could bring about his ouster—Was he maintaining some internal deterrence against the Kurds and Shiites or external deterrence against Iran, buying time to spirit the contraband into Syria, or husbanding disparate pieces to reconstitute the WMD program down the road?—he had not complied with Resolution 1441, which demanded a full accounting, unfettered access to weapons sites and complete disarmament.

Chirac saw the same intelligence as Blair and Bush.
[color=red]His spy agency agreed with the consensus view held by the rest of the West.[/color]
But none of that mattered. When the US and UK pressed the Security Council to consider their “use of force” resolution, Chirac dispatched his foreign minister to more than a dozen capitals to organize an international opposition against his erstwhile allies. In fact, when the UK and Canada circulated an eleventh-hour compromise, France actually rejected the plan before Iraq.

Mincing no words, Blair concluded that Chirac was gambling with nothing less than the transatlantic alliance. “The outcome of this issue will now determine more than the fate of the Iraqi regime and more than the future of the Iraqi people, for so long brutalized by Saddam. It will determine the way Britain and the world confront the central security threat of the 21st century; the development of the UN; the relationship between Europe and the US; the relations within the EU and the way the US engages with the rest of the world. It will determine the pattern of international politics for the next generation…We laid down an ultimatum calling upon Saddam to come into line with resolution 1441 or be in material breach. Not an unreasonable proposition, given the history. But still countries hesitated.”

And he called them by name. “France said it would veto a second resolution whatever the circumstances. Then France denounced the six tests. Later that day, Iraq rejected them.” That’s right: Blair was reminding the world that Jacques Chirac rejected the compromise measure even before Saddam Hussein.

No matter. The shameless Chirac would then condemn the US-led attack on Saddam’s regime because it was “undertaken without the approval of the United Nations…which is the only legitimate framework for building peace in Iraq.” Of course, if the UN is the sole source of legitimacy for military action, then Chirac has some explaining to do. After all, on the very same week that coalition forces attacked Saddam’s regime, hundreds of French troops poured into the Central African Republic to protect French interests after a coup. France didn’t ask the UN for permission. And this was anything but an isolated case of French unilateralism. Chirac openly defied calls from the UN to relinquish control over Mayotte, an island off the coast of Comoros in eastern Africa.
[color=red]And with all but two NATO members siding with the US and UK—in fact, fully 21 of the EU’s 25 members supported the campaign in Iraq—Chirac’s behavior before, during and after Saddam’s fall amounted to unilateralism within a multilateral context[/color]
.

Chirac was just as bad on Afghanistan. In 2004, there was wide agreement to augment NATO’s 6,500-man commitment in Afghanistan with elements of the new NATO Response Force (NRF), a self-contained rapid-reaction unit of warplanes, warships and 20,000 troops. Predictably, Chirac balked, declaring, “The NRF is not designed for this. It shouldn’t be used for any old matter.” Some of us took issue with the notion that the security and long-term stability of the very place that incubated al Qaeda and spawned 9/11 is just “any old matter.”

Throughout his stay at the Elysee Palace, Chirac’s policies seemed to be fueled by resentment with American power, perhaps even a sad inferiority complex vis-à-vis America. Sometimes this was expressed in serious matters, as in Afghanistan and Iraq, sometimes in pathetic and silly episodes. Take the example of when his countrymen rejected his beloved EU constitution. Chirac incredibly seemed to blame the Yanks and the Brits. “The Anglo-Saxons and the Americans’ interest is, of course, to stop the European development, which risks tomorrow to lead to a much [stronger] Europe.”

Or consider “Quaero”—the Franco-German effort to build an Internet search engine to rival and surpass Google. At Chirac’s urging, EU governments poured 250 million euros (or $294 million) into the project. “We must take up the challenge of the American giants Yahoo! and Google,” he said in 2006, adding that what’s at stake is “cultural diversity against the looming threat of uniformity.” It pays to recall that he was talking about a service that helps people search for pictures, videos, music and blogs—a service that was created by a pair of American grad students without any public monies.

Perhaps that says it all about Chirac’s presidency. It began with him defending French honor on the Balkan battlefront—and ended with him trying to plant the EU flag on some tiny patch of cyberspace.[/quote]

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Congratulations Sarkozy. Very much looking forward to the new French administration. Vive la France, one of America’s greatest allies.

Promises to refrain from comment, and then proceeds to do exactly that. How interesting.

Just a typical post of mine. It is the norm so get used to it haha.

Just a typical post of mine. It is the norm so get used to it haha.[/quote]

Snake Eyes has no problem with that. Just as long as we are under no illusions.

Soon it will be Bush good bye or good riddance.
:bouncy:

[quote]Soon it will be Bush good bye or good riddance.[/quote] :bravo:

I can’t wait this to happen!!! but he is already a jok, can’t be worst then that. We don’t need to wait him to leave the white house to know what crap he did.

After the Iraq war and UN Security Council fiasco, the only major world leaders who were re-elected were those that supported the effort: Blair, Howard and Bush. All those who were against LOST or stepped down. That includes Chretien, Chirac, Schroeder. The minor prizes for the left are Spain and Italy. Okay, you can have those!

[quote=“SHARLEE”]Soon it will be Bush good bye or good riddance.
:bouncy:[/quote]
Yes…thats how the US election system works. And rarely, if ever, with cars being burned on the streets.

[quote=“TainanCowboy”][quote=“SHARLEE”]Soon it will be Bush good bye or good riddance.
:bouncy:[/quote]
Yes…thats how the US election system works. And rarely, if ever, with cars being burned on the streets.[/quote]

I thought you were a child of the 60’s? While not directly connected to the election, I seem to recall some small disturbances at that time. But hey, we were all smoking too much right?

Chirac did not step down because of the war. On the opposite, he is highly praised by everyone, (from Sarkozy to the opposition included and probably all around the world for having opposed the war.) The anti war position was the ONLY good thing to put to his credit.

He will remain in history books for this as your Mr Bush will remain in history books but not for the same reasons. No comment on this from my side.

And TC, our elections system doesn t need any recount to get the name of our next president
:s :wink:

We re going to love America without Bush. Vive l Amerique et vive l’Europe.

[quote=“Elegua”][quote=“TainanCowboy”][quote=“SHARLEE”]Soon it will be Bush good bye or good riddance.
:bouncy:[/quote]Yes…thats how the US election system works. And rarely, if ever, with cars being burned on the streets.[/quote]I thought you were a child of the 60’s? While not directly connected to the election, I seem to recall some small disturbances at that time. But hey, we were all smoking too much right?[/quote]
Quite right about the era thing. The '60’s in the US were a time of great social unrest. Rioting, destruction terrorist groups operating - just to name a few.
However…the changing of Presidents did not incur any of those things.

Really. Didn’t he once consider a fourth term of seven years following this one?

Strange then that he scores so low on public opinion polls, eh?

Are you aware of Sarkozy’s position on the Iraq invasion? and Chirac’s actions at the time? He was against the invasion of Iraq but more critical of Chirac’s actions than Bush’s.

I agree that he was highly popular for his opposition to the war. I disagree, however, that he acted for the noble reasons that he claimed he did. I think that he is an asshole and I think that while honest differences of opinion are not only to be expected but also to be respected, he was a shit of the first water. Ditto for Villepin. They knew exactly what they were up to and it had neither the best interests of the US nor the UN nor the Iraqi people, nor the world order at heart. History will not treat them kindly and I hope that Sarkozy allows a full investigation into corruption charges against Chirac to proceed. I will cry crocodile tears while the process moves forward.

Here we will have a parting of opinion. I think that in history, Bush will go down as highly revolutionary and important for his action to democratize the Middle East and to remove Saddam before he became a credible threat. I think that Chirac will barely warrant an asterisk. He and his tenure will be nearly completely forgotten, a collective yawn on the part of tomorrow’s historians.

You two! haha

I believe that all of Bush’s actions were necessary and desirable but I do recognize that this has been too much of a push and people do not like change especially when needed. France is not exceptional in this regard. I, too, therefore, despite my loyalty, admiration and approval of Bush and his policies, will welcome a less divisive figure taking office ALSO in the US in 2009.

Final note: Again, even under Chirac, relations improved dramatically once everything was fait accompli. To my view, the French have been some of the US’ best allies since 2003. The cooperation on Lebanon, in Afghanistan, but especially with regard to intelligence has been sterling and I would argue even of more important value and depth than our very close relationship with the UK. Certainly, much more than Germany.

This is not the only issue where we have a parting opinion. We have a parting opinion on everything.
I said I have no comment and I will abide by my statement on this. You do know what I think on this

You two what ?

[quote]
I believe that all of Bush’s actions were necessary and desirable but I do recognize that this has been too much of a push and people do not like change especially when needed. France is not exceptional in this regard. I, too, therefore, despite my loyalty, admiration and approval of Bush and his policies, will welcome a less divisive figure taking office ALSO in the US in 2009.

Final note: Again, even under Chirac, relations improved dramatically once everything was fait accompli. To my view, the French have been some of the US’ best allies since 2003. The cooperation on Lebanon, in Afghanistan, but especially with regard to intelligence has been sterling and I would argue even of more important value and depth than our very close relationship with the UK. Certainly, much more than Germany.[/quote]

Fred Smith, really feeling the change of wind now (Blair going and your own fellow citizen disapproving more and more of Bush decisions ) ?

Sorry to correct you, but the french have always been cooperative, before 911 (but you didn t listen), after 911 and prior the Iraq invasion (but you didn t listen again), and until now. So who has been the arrogant one here ?

We are all looking forward to a change in 2009 and hope this happens. It might not be all rosy but it can t be worse. And hopefully we can all work together because this is the key of success.

I will praise Bush for one thing though.
His self deprecating sense of humor.

You once had a former actor as a president, maybe Bush could do the opposite and become in 2009 a comedy actor.

Third term is correct. My mistake. He had served previously as prime minister not president.

That was not what the fight in the UN was all about and I think that even you know and understand that. Ironic that his “understanding” of the Middle East caused him to openly defy international law and UN sanctions requirements. France became one of the largest illegal trading partners of the Saddam regime and one of the biggest sources of its weaponry between 2000 and 2003. Naughty. Naughty.

Hey, I realize that he is unpopular but what would you have to say to his greater unpopularity than say Chavez? Castro? Putin? Arafat? Assad? Saddam? the mullahs? Clearly, something emotional and not rational is taking place when these kinds of feelings emerge.

Nope. That is NOT what happened. France under Chirac has been quite a petulant little actor on the world stage. The actions of France in the UN Security Council were shameless. Everyone involved understands full well what Chirac and de Villepin were up to, including Sarkozy hence his public disavowal of their actions while noting that he would have chosen not to invade Iraq while having handled it in a much more professional and courteous way.

Agreed. I am glad that even under Chirac, relations were much improved. I have no idea why but I have always had a soft spot for France. It makes for a hell of a better place to visit than Finland or Albania for that matter even Germany or Netherlands or Wales or England… You get the idea. Italy though… But I will never ever forget what de Villepin and Chirac pulled in 2002/3. Shocked me to my very core and got me rereading Livy and Thucydides for comfort! By the way, I was the only one openly cheering France in the West stands during the Rugby Sevens. Does that count for something? a bottle of Drappier? perhaps? two?

Two down, one to go Fred?

Maybe his friends will miss him?

and then again maybe some won’t.

Fred, here are some avatars for you.

[quote=“fred smith”]Hey, I realize that he is unpopular but what would you have to say to his greater unpopularity than say Chavez? Castro? Putin? Arafat? Assad? Saddam? the mullahs? Clearly, something emotional and not rational is taking place when these kinds of feelings emerge.
[/quote]

Bush is at the head of the most powerful nation. His decisions have an impact on every corner of this world. Hence, he should think twice and stronger than all others of the consequences of his decisions. Not only for american people but for the rest of the world. It is not fine to hear him say, better fight over there (Iraq) than here (the US). Nope. Especially when Iraq did not threaten the US.
Chavez, Castro, what power do they have ? Can they blow up the world ? No.

Bush is at the head of the biggest democracy in the world. A democracy we liked to identify ourselves.
Naturally, the standards are higher for the US than those of the mullahs because the mullahs do not share the same values and we do not expect them to follow our values. The president of the US should not be above the laws (and above all the international laws)

[quote]
France under Chirac has been quite a petulant little actor on the world .[/quote]

Agree ahaha.
Agree that Chirac was a petulant actor. He should have pushed it further. All this fuss for nothing. He should have proposed something in favor of this multipolar world. Instead he backed up.
And agree that sometimes Chirac was not a courteous man.

[quote]

Agreed. I am glad that even under Chirac, relations were much improved. I have no idea why but I have always had a soft spot for France. It makes for a hell of a better place to visit than Finland or Albania for that matter even Germany or Netherlands or Wales or England… You get the idea. Italy though… But I will never ever forget what de Villepin and Chirac pulled in 2002/3. Shocked me to my very core and got me rereading Livy and Thucydides for comfort! By the way, I was the only one openly cheering France in the West stands during the Rugby Sevens. Does that count for something? a bottle of Drappier? perhaps? two?[/quote]

I also like my country best but there are plenty of nice places in Europe . It is so diverse and that s what make it fun to live in. I like diversity, I like the exchange of ideas
You got shoked by words, I understand. But hopefully you will understand those kids in Iraq or wherever, shocked and hurt by actions of some people whose decisions were to promise a better world and who are not delivering. They are going to keep some resentment for quite a while. You understand this, do you ?

What s this rugby Sevens ?
We ll host the world cup of rugby starting september. Going to enjoy that time as a volunteer in Paris in the Parc des Princes.
You are going to play against England and South Africa.
Nice choice the Drappier.

I m not going to miss Chirac. Changes were needed. Younger men or women with a better undestanding of the economical world. But I respect him for having served France for 40 years

Remember though that most of NATO and even 21 of 25 EU members supported us. How much more multilateral do we have to get? haha

But they are still bad people.

What international laws has Bush broken? Also, this the US must be perfect argument is bullshit. Take a look at France’s actions with regard to Saddam and Iraq. I think that under those conditions, it would be a bit rich for France to say anything at all about any minor lapses the US may make in that country.

[quote]I also like my country best but there are plenty of nice places in Europe . It is so diverse and that s what make it fun to live in. I like diversity, I like the exchange of ideas
You got shoked by words, I understand. But hopefully you will understand those kids in Iraq or wherever, shocked and hurt by actions of some people whose decisions were to promise a better world and who are not delivering. They are going to keep some resentment for quite a while. You understand this, do you ? [/quote]

First of all, let’s go back and examine this statement of yours. The kids (people) of Iraq were being killed at roughly the rate of 30,000 per year under Saddam. ONLY now are the death rates equal to what occurred under his reign. This does not include his many wars, nor does it include the corruption that plagued the UN oil for food program and those deaths from malnutrition and lack of sufficient medical supplies during sanctions even though Saddaam had the money to buy all these things.

So we have roughly 75,000 Iraqi dead in four years of US “control.” That averages out to roughly 18,000 per year or roughly half the direct death rate during Saddam’s reign of terror. Then, we have 500,000 to 1 million dead during sanctions (supposedly) so that works out to 50,000 to 100,000 per year from 1991 to 2002. The major operators and interests that aided a corrupt Saddam during this time were first and foremost the UN, followed by Russia, China and France and the neighboring nations who flouted the sanctions regime and therefore DIRECTLY and REPEATEDLY violated international law. One could argue that the US action against Saddam was NOT legal, but then it was NOT illegal either since the UN never voted to condemn the US action and later APPROVED its occupation.

Championship held in HK every March.

[quote]We ll host the world cup of rugby starting september. Going to enjoy that time as a volunteer in Paris in the Parc des Princes.
You are going to play against England and South Africa.
Nice choice the Drappier. [/quote]

So how many bottles are you going to send me. The bouquet is all red clover. It reminds me of horseback riding in August in Minnesota or along the Baltic and then stopping to sleep in a clover field until the sun dropped to the point where it got cold, I woke up and then rode back. That is why I love Drappier. It brings that all back to me. And reminds me of being young! haha

Understood though my sympathies do not extend thus…

Sarkozy has done a masterstroke with his new cabinet appointments.
And Bernard Kouchner was a magnificent choice. A Socialist who supports the Coalition Forces in Iraq.
And of course, members of Kouchner’s Socialist Party branded him a traitor for taking a ministerial position under Sarkozy, who beat Socialist Ségolène Royal for the presidency.
Socialist Party spokesman Benoit Hamon said the party will expel Kouchner. “He joined a government of the right, the government that we are fighting,” Hamon said. “There’s nothing more for him inside our party.”

Its the French way of saying…Congratulations!

i saw this thread too late but sharlee’s been saying it better than i could

vive la france!