[A-List] France: Sarkozy and the US challenge

[Michael Keaney]

Al-Hayat reported:

Before Sarkozy's election as President of France there was an impression
that Nicolas Sarkozy's relations with the US will resemble those of Tony
Blair. Everyone believed that his links with the US, his political
approach and his interest in Israel's security, above all, would make
him the most US subordinate French President.

This belief has been strengthened after Sarkozy kicked off his
diplomatic activity at the G8 summit in Germany. Although he was
slightly indisposed, President George W. Bush insisted on receiving his
French counterpart on the sidelines of the summit at his suite.

Bush expressed great respect for Sarkozy's diplomatic adviser,
Jean-David Levitte, who served as ambassador to Washington before
assuming his new post. During a meeting of the eight presidents, Bush
stood up to greet Levitte, in a gesture of respect noticed by everyone
in the room.

There were also clear gestures from Bush to Sarkozy as the former
invited the latter to visit him in US. The French President said that he
would visit the US next September, the date of the convening of UN
General Assembly.

In spite of these gestures, that reflect a new start in the French-US
alliance following France's opposing attitude toward the US war in Iraq,
there are still differences in the two president's analyses.

*****

I would have thought so. As a conspicuous admirer of De Gaulle, Sarkozy
will not warm whatsoever to US condescension and its popular "culture's"
derision of France and Frenchness. The US role in Africa, as
periodically highlighted here by Chris Black, is counter to French
interests and has even gone so far as to engage in a low intensity proxy
conflict. US tentacles expanding along the west coast of Africa in
search of secure oil supplies will force any French president to come to
terms with the challenge to traditional French and European
"stewardship". 

Sarko is also breaking some European taboos. Right now Financial Times
commentators are extremely pessimistic about Sarko because of his
apparent intention to cut the European Central Bank down to size. How
dare he even question, let alone threaten, the neoliberal edifice. It
remains to be seen how that goes because election rhetoric is to be
distinguished from policy. Once he gets his domestic agenda in order he
can focus more squarely on foreign policy. Of course if he chooses to
tackle the labour movement head on then he will lose his ability to
withstand outside pressure to conform to the norms of the "international
community", and any effort at undermining European institutions will
likely fail. Possibly he will have learned from the failure of Gerhard
Schröder, although unlike Schröder he has no labour movement to lose.
But at least he need not alienate it further. Fortunately the
ever-reliable Financial Times commentators are also pessimistic about
Sarko's domestic reform agenda. Meanwhile perhaps Putin should arrange
for Gazprom, Lukoil and others to cosy up to Total whilst pushing for
further enlargement of the EADS stake. Some cooperation with Thales
might also sweeten the pot. If he was really sneaky he could give Total
an option on the rewritten Shell and BP contracts that are so exercising
the British government, which by now is so prostrate before US power as
to be invertebrate. In this, De Gaulle has been proven essentially
correct.

Michael Keaney


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