Jacques Dandi To The Rescue!

Well folks, France has finally roused herself from her sloth and announced to a justifiably jittery Turkey, "I'll protect you." Yah.

France detests being merely a "member" of anything let alone NATO and has long bristled at the idea of following anyone's lead, most of all the United States.

France also has a huge Muslim "guest worker" population a large percentage of which hails from Turkey. They are not happy campers, and given the gentle care they've received from their hosts, have taken to burning down whole apartment complexes in the out lying districts of Paris. No doubt the recent refusal of France to support Turkey's NATO request sat well with them.

France has also been a leading proponent of the EU and very much a proponent of being a member more equal than others in that union. In fact, France and Germany have been only marginally subtle in their bullish mission to divide up the power structure of a European Union amongst the two all the while trying to make sure that among equals, each will end up being the most equal of all.

It's not a far stretch to plot this graph out to a reasonably logical conclusion that France has a long term plan in post Cold War Europe to reach a goal via the EU of opting out of NATO altogether and creating for herself a role of military pre-eminence in Europe as the defacto leader of an EU that, under the stewardship of France, no longer needs NATO, most specifically, the United States.

At least as reported in the story below, France isn't pledging NATO support of Turkey, in fact France, ( gasp! ), is proposing to go it alone on her own recognizance. Chirac does not aver, "we", ala NATO or the UN, will support and defend Turkey. Chirac states, and this cannot be a mistake, "France would fulfil its obligations if Turkey was threatened." True, there's a bit of wiggle room there. This could be parsed at length.

In the realm of diplomacy, such a first person possessive in not a mistake. And France is nothing if not hyper sensitive to proper grammatical usage.

=============================================> Chirac Says France Would Protect Turkey in War PARIS (Reuters) - France assured Turkey on Wednesday it would help defend Ankara if war breaks out in neighboring Iraq, even though Paris vetoed NATO (news - web sites) defense proposals this week.

French President Jacques Chirac telephoned Turkish President Ahmet Necdet Sezer to pledge support and protection in the event of a war, his spokeswoman said.

"Chirac assured the Turkish president of France's full solidarity and said France would fulfil its obligations if Turkey was threatened," spokeswoman Catherine Colonna quoted Chirac as telling Sezer.

Chirac told Sezer France's decision this week to veto NATO planning to protect Turkey in case of war did not jeopardize Paris's solidarity with Ankara.

Sezer told Chirac -- who has repeatedly said military action in Iraq should only be a last resort -- that he also backed a peaceful solution to the crisis in Iraq, which the United States accuses of harboring banned weapons of mass destruction.

France, Germany and Belgium on Monday vetoed proposals to plan for defending Turkey on the grounds that such a move could send a signal that diplomatic efforts to solve the crisis were over.

Earlier on Wednesday France shot down a compromise aimed at breaking the NATO deadlock over Turkey, dashing hopes for a swift end to a row that is damaging the Western alliance.

Diplomats say the three doves are unlikely to budge until after chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix reports to the Security Council on Friday.

Well folks, France has finally roused herself from her sloth and announced to a justifiably jittery Turkey, "I'll protect you." Yah.

Let's consider this from the story reprinted below.

France detests being merely a "member" of anything let alone NATO and has long bristled at the idea of following anyone's lead, most of all the United States.

Chirac told Sezer France's decision this week to veto NATO planning to protect Turkey in case of war did not jeopardize Paris's solidarity with Ankara.

Which, I am sure, was news to the Turks. "I'll hold your coat" is not exactly an unswerving avowal of blood brotherhood, ne c'est pas?

France also has a huge Muslim "guest worker" population

Too damn lazy to clean their own bidets.

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