French press asks what drives Chirac on Iraq

Reuters | 2/27/03 | Tom Heneghan

[Straight Vermonter]

The French have started to consider a world without Americans to give them cover. Kinda like a kid who wants his freedom until he has to pay his own bills.

[dennisw]

Saddam Saddam o' pal o' mine!

[guitfiddlist]

French press asks what drives Chirac on Iraq

That's easy. Let us borrow a phrase from some of our homegrown morons: "It's like all about the oil, man."

[JohnHuang2]

French press asks what drives Chirac on Iraq

kats, I noticed a typo in the header.

Should read: French press asks what drives Chiraq on Iraq

[Oldeconomybuyer]

"The French are quite reconciled to the fact that they will have no influence," he said.

Hmmm. Maybe the French aren't as stoopid as I thought ...

[Semper Paratus]

The American political landscape is littered with road kill of those who tried to get in front of W.

[LibWhacker]

France will have to decide whether to use its veto and risk serious damage to relations with the United States . . .

It's way too late for the froggies on that score. The damage is already done and we're already relishing how we might respond to french squeals for assistance next time some tinpot tyrant decides to kick their butts.

[7 x 77]

"one of the essential levers of French foreign policy"

How weak is that?

[ZAKJAN]

Isn't there an old american classic Kids song that ends with..

"And the Cheese stands alone" ????

What goes around always seems to come around..

Oh, i forgot "And the Rat ate the cheese.. The rat ate the cheese!"

[DB]

"But they might have more influence over the other people in the region if they take a principled stand than if they don't."

That "principled" stand is only principled in the eyes of the remaining tyrants in the region and there is nothing other than tyrants in the region... So France seeks favor with tyrants… Nothing really changes…

France again is placing its bets on the wrong team...

[concerned about politics]

Hailed only last week as a "peace warrior", President Jacques Chirac is now arousing some concern in Paris that his determined drive against war in Iraq could trap France in an uncomfortable anti-American corner.

Uhhhhh. They just figured it out? They've gotta have liberal brains. There's no other explaination for their densness.
Really.
Honestly.
Seriesly.
They have no idea how much French wine and cheese is floating through American sewers?
Hello? Helllllloooooo?

[hobbes1]

More and more it is beginning to look like the French President has a little dirty laundry, that will turn up when Baghdad falls.

[ErnBatavia]

Chirac looks like that gay blade Charles Nelson Reilly in that pic. Maybe Saddam has a roll of 35mm tucked away someplace?

[Dog Gone]

"The Achilles heel of the French position is that France can only emerge from this crisis a winner if the least probable outcome happens, that is, that Saddam Hussein turns himself into a zealous servant of the U.N.'s orders," it wrote.

That is a point that some of us have been making for months. Chirac has painted himself into a corner, and since Hussein won't bail him out, the only possible damage control for the frenchlings is to now wholeheartedly endorse the American position.

I don't see that happening, either.

[concerned about politics]

"What's got into him?" the conservative weekly Le Point asked on its latest cover. The left-leaning daily Liberation wondered: "What is Chirac seeking in Iraq?"

Honesty is his policy. When he's bought, he stays bought.

[ZAKJAN]

Dirty Laundry? VERY long read but VERY informative

Energy Information Administration

http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/iraq.html


Post-U.N. Sanctions Development Plans
As of October 2002, Iraq reportedly had signed several multi-billion dollar deals with foreign oil companies mainly from China, France, and Russia. Deutsche Bank estimates $38 billion total on new fields --

[steve-b]

some deputies in his centre-right ranks, preparing for a placid parliamentary debate on Iraq on Wednesday, began asking what the longer-term effects of France's campaign would be

One effect: The occupation forces will have instructions to go over the wreck of Saddam's WMD machinery with an electron microscope to find all the "FABRIQUE EN FRANCE" labels.

[concerned about politics]

"He is sticking to his conviction that he's not a little mosquito biting the American elephant but that a majority of world public opinion and governments is with him," it wrote.

This sounds like he's talking to his left wing voters . A section where the voting population is dense - from the neck up.

[ZAKJAN]

Dirty Laundry? VERY long read but VERY informative

Energy Information Administration

http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/iraq.html


Post-U.N. Sanctions Development Plans
As of October 2002, Iraq reportedly had signed several multi-billion dollar deals with foreign oil companies mainly from China, France, and Russia. Deutsche Bank estimates $38 billion total on new fields --