Funny.
The author expounds on the foreign policy failures of an American presidential administration, and blames the French.
The author looks at the current situation, in which the FRENCH President has warned that France will respond with nuclear weapons to any terrorist attacks with WMD against France, but the AMERICAN President dismissed any talks of attacks on Iran as "wild speculation".
Meanwhile, the current American Administration is going the diplomatic route, and failing at it too. And this too is all laid at the feet of the French.
How grand and glorious it is to be France! So despised by the Americans, and yet apparently so utterly in command of US foreign policy that American Presidents, Democratic and Republican, are in thrall to "The French Strategy"!
Methinks the pundit protesteth too much.
But maybe he's right. In which case the Bush Administration, like the Carter Administration, is a good deal less than "no better than the French". They are far, far stupider than the French. Because, when you get right down to it, France has PROFITED from selling arms to Israel AND buying oil from Iran and Iraq. But the US has taken "the French strategy" only halfway: pussilanimous retreat into ineffective diplomacy, but does not have the intelligence to be able, at least, to make money off of it.
Actually, I think it is regrettable that the French are used as a backdrop for his argument for the very reason you mention. Chirac has made a profound statement regarding Iran...and I am sure the President sees that as support for action.
However, back to the real issue at hand. Iran is going to require action. If its leadership were stable, there would still be serious problems with their developing a nuclear weapons capacity. But with the mullahs (and Armageddon-johnny) at the helm, there is only one option.