How France blocked U.S. in Ankara

Everybody knows that Turkey did not permit America to stage operations from Turkish bases, but hardly anybody realizes that, contrary to the conventional wisdom, the vote was not an Islamic protest against the American-led coalition,but an act of anti-American intimidation by France and Germany.

The Turkish government, which for the first time since the fall of the Ottoman Empire is based on an Islamic party, fully expected that Parliament would approve its proposal that America be given the use of Turkish air bases in the Iraqi war.The government was so confident that the party failed to demand internal discipline, and thus several deputies voted against the resolution.

But that does not account for the failure to approve the government’s proposal.

Primary blame for the defeat of the measure lies with the opposition — the secular, Kemalist parties that have governed the country since Ataturk.

Contrary to expectations, the opposition, responding to orders from party leaders, voted unanimously against the government’s position.

The leaders insisted on a disciplined "no" vote because of pressure — some would call it blackmail — from France and Germany.

The French and German governments informed the Turkish opposition parties that if they voted to help the Coalition war effort, Turkey would be locked out of Europe for a generation. As one Turkish leader put it, "there were no promises, only threats."

One can describe this behavior on the part of our erstwhile Old Europe allies only as a deliberate act of sabotage against America in time of war.

It is even worse than the behavior of France in the Security Council — first joining with us to give Iraq a "really, really, last chance" and then preventing us from acting as if the language of Resolution 1441 meant what it said.

It is of a piece with the exertions of French diplomats to "convince"African countries to vote against us in the U.N.

I think that when the events of the past few months are sorted out, we will find that French actions constitute the diplomatic equivalent of chemical and biological warfare.

Monsieur Chirac has stopped at nothing to try to prevent the defeat of Saddam Hussein, no matter how many American lives it cost.

It is hard to imagine that such actions were solely the result of greed, whether personal or national.

To take such action, Mr. Chirac must have conceived of a French future not only independent of the United States, but in open opposition to us.

To be sure, he does not speak of France alone, or of the Franco/German entente, but rather of "Europe."

But he sees Europe as an extension of French power, not as a federal union in which all states will be free to pull their weight and pursue their sometimes diverging interests.

Thus, his rude insults to the Central European countries who joined with Spain, Denmark, Italy, the Netherlands and the others who support our efforts to liberate Iraq.

President Bush the Elder intuited the emergence of a new world order once the Soviet empire fell,but it is only now that we can begin to see the profundity of the changes and the magnitude of the challenges we will face in the immediate future.

To blame a transformation of such magnitude on the diplomatic style of this administration, as so many of President George W. Bush’s critics do, is to personalize, and thereby trivialize a world-historical event.

You can take the following anyway you wish, but it isn't idle speculation.

The Turks handled the issue of allowing troops in to go to Northern Iraq in a democratic way, albeit devious to the core! The vote actually would have allowed the move except for the heads who were present but didn't vote and thus were counted in the 'percentages'.

Was this a conscious action on the Parliament's part? I think so. Every action since that vote indicates a delaying tactic. Why? Because the Turks wanted a fair excuse to send troops into Northern Iraq to deal with Iraqi military, then stay to deal with the Kurds.

How could their delaying have accomplished this? If the U.S. couldn't mount a Northern front and the Kurds couldn't be controlled to put up a strong line against Iraqi military incursion (and without the presence of U.S. Special Forces personnel there, they wouldn't have!), the Turkish military would have been 'rescuing' the front and getting the long awaited chance to flex their might against the Kurds who wish to link up with the Turkish Kurds to form a free Kurdistan with oil wealth in Mosul and Kirkuk.

In summary, the Turks manipulated the situation, trying to get the U.S. to approve thier moving massive military assitance into Northern Iraq, for Turkish reasons, not coalition reasons. Frankly, I can see why, but the war between Kurds and Turks would have made the current action in Southern Iraq look like a Sunday School picnic.

I should have put a sarcasm tag in that last post...

I still think you're full of it. Attempting to link a particular person with an "agenda" is intellectual laziness. It allows the attacker to argue against the "agenda" (which he probably has previously marshalled arguments for) instead of the specifics of what was said (because the attacker probably doesn't have any arguments ready for that).

A communist is not wrong because he is a communist; he is wrong because his IDEAS are wrong. Whenever I hear someone start off about the neo-cons or paleo-cons or whatever, it just tells me that the arguer is looking for a way to avoid actually proving his point; he's looking to fit the opposition into an invented (see the definition of "straw dog logical fallacy") position. There's no difference in dismissing someone because of some invented label and dismissing them because they are one of the joos [or insert your favorite target group here].

So inventing labels, then deciding that someone is a "member" of that labeled group, then associating that label with some idea you don't like and think you can easily demolish, and then attacking your opponent for being a label you invented and supporting ideas you chose to attribute to him isn't argument. It's an attempt to avoid logical argument, and it shows what kind of support you really have...

US and Europe Oceans Apart over Iraq

By talking about a crisis within NATO the mass media are inadvertently assessing the current political rift in Brussels from the US point of view. It is interesting to observe that France, Germany and Belgium's recent use of the right of veto, as set down in the Washington NATO agreement, is being seen as the downfall of Western European solidarity, whereas the USA's constant disregard for NATO approval is seen as NATO being effective. The most remarkable thing is that the resistance which has built up over the years to any 'Atlantic' or 'continental' strategy within the alliance is making every effort to keep silence. When NATO was formed in 1949 the structure of the alliance provided against individual countries getting their own way. For one thing, it was decided that decisions would be wholly political and the joint military command in Mons was really just a formality that could be used to resolve technical military problems. Secondly, all NATO members were granted the right of veto, which a country could impose to prevent any NATO resolution. Thirdly, the USA, the big brother of NATO, did not scorn the advice of its allies before getting them involved in the Persian Gulf and Yugoslavia. On this occasion, due to the lack of time, the USA has not played by the rules and consequently NATO has reacted with some resistance. Three countries have imposed a veto on the US proposal to provide military assistance to Turkey in case of an early start to the war in Iraq. NATO's rules have come into play, for the first time demonstrating that it was originally conceived as a defensive alliance. The British newspaper The Guardian has been asking who is to blame for this European split. It seems the blame is being put on all those who have been involved in resolving the Iraqi crisis. The standard laws of diplomacy, as The Guardian writes, have been broken: instead of discussing the problem quietly behind closed doors negotiators have immediately grabbed their loud-speakers. The British newspaper sees American Defense Minister Donald Rumsfeld as the real culprit for his harsh talk of 'old Europe.' However it may be that British Prime Minister Tony Blair's overtly 'western' foreign policy may have been the deciding factor, The Guardian also writes. The newspaper goes on to say though that Mr Blair could possibly try to make peace with Europe and such a move would undoubtedly give him more influence immediately on both sides of the Atlantic. Neither Belgium, France nor Germany see anything unusual in their use of the veto. All three have spoken out though and this shows that there is a lack of consensus on this issue, the main ingredient for NATO solidarity. France has always had difficult relations with NATO. From 1949 NATO headquarters were based in Versailles and Fontainebleau while military headquarters were located in Rocquencourt. However in 1966 French General Charles De Gaulle, dreaming of a revival of French majesty, chased NATO out of France into Brussels and Mons. France withdrew from the integrated military structure of NATO and remained only as a political presence within the alliance. Together with Konrad Adenauer the French general basically created what we know today as the European Union, a source of European power to counterbalance that of the USA. So the real NATO crisis came and went in 1966. The alliance only survived out of fear of the growing Soviet bloc. The current resistance of France and Germany, the continental buttress of NATO, only goes to show that the political institutions of NATO have developed and that now every member of the alliance has to bear a much greater responsibility for maintaining peace on the continent. If there is a crisis as such, then it is in the contradiction between 'Atlantic' and 'continental' strategies for further NATO development. A battle of ideologies has been going on in Brussels for the past decade. The forcefulness of the USA has led us to believe that NATO is facing an 'Atlantic' future but it now seems that 'continental' ideas are gathering strength. A quiet war of bureaucracy is being waged in Brussels. The bright glass and concrete EU buildings are undermining the barbed-wire defenses of NATO headquarters. There is no love lost between NATO and EU diplomats. There is widespread criticism within the NATO camp of the EU plan to create a joint EU strike force and the stubborn Javier Solana, now speaking for the EU, is insisting on the creation of an EU army. In a recent forecast of NATO in 2011 a member of the NATO policy planning department predicted that NATO would be a lot bigger than the EU but 'the unique political and military role of the USA will mean that the alliance will continue to make joint decisions.' Also, NATO would prefer it if the EU took on the role of 'consolidating the military role of Europe in the Balkans.' EU ministers have a much different attitude to the future of European armed forces. For the European Union having a joint EU army is just as important as the Euro and the EU flag. This is especially true of those countries which are not a part of NATO. Commander-in-Chief of the Finnish Armed Forces General Gustav Hagglund described the planned 60 thousand strong European army as an important and distinctive symbol of the European Union, with the same significance as the euro and the EU flag. All of this is causing Washington some concern that sooner or later the EU will come to rival NATO and possibly even displace it, despite Tony Blair's assurances that this is not the case. The Germany-France axis is essentially aimed at bringing structural reform within the EU, which could provide the union with a single foreign and defense policy. This, in its turn, would help to break the USA's hegemony in NATO. Current events only represent a crisis in US domination of NATO and the development of the EU's military dimension will depend on the strength of US reaction to the policy of France and Germany. At the end of the eighties France and Germany set up a joint council on defense and security. In October 1991 the two countries informed the EU leadership of their intention to create the Eurocorps, a joint military unit which could be joined on a voluntary basis by all members of what was then the West European Union. In May 1992 France and Germany prepared a document for the creation of the Eurocorps which was then dismissed as the European arm of NATO. In November 2000 the EU leadership announced its intention to create a joint army within the next three years. Its official English name is Rapid Reaction Force. The nucleus of this army will be the above-mentioned Eurocorps which currently includes troops from Germany, France, Spain, Belgium and Luxembourg. Basically France is preparing a new continental security force which could counterbalance US dominance in Brussels. Those countries seeking to join NATO now find themselves in a difficult situation. They can not support war in Iraq unconditionally when public opinion is so obviously against it. On the other hand, they can not support France and Germany without jeopardizing their own entry into NATO. However, in Europe itself people will not countenance a lack of principles, i.e. behaving like a flock of sheep being led to the slaughter. Written by Ilya Nikiforov, Tallinn. Translated by Nick Chesters

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