Is France going to depart from the position adopted by General de Gaulle in 1996? It is the last country in the Union that is able to resist, even oppose, the US line, but not as a matter of principle: often it represents an alternative view. Full integration into NATO implies subordination to a foreign power whose interests are on occasion not at all the same as Europe’s. The EU is a power, but one that lacks determination and self-confidence. Yet the world needs the pole that it is its vocation to become.
Europe and its ESDP, or NATO?
On 5 February 2003, ten European countries(1) felt it appropriate to announce their conclusion regarding information that the United States had presented to the UN Security Council: that there was unquestionable proof that Iraq was pursuing programmes for weapons of mass destruction. In 2004, seven members of this group of ten countries, the Vilnius Group,(2) also became members of NATO and later of the EU.
Their letter followed that sent by eight other European leaders.(3) It was all a grotesque farce followed by vigorous denials but it would be naive to imagine that the US administration would repent. Yet its decisions and those of the US President plunged part of humanity into wars and structural violence to which we can see no end. ‘Old Europe’ can be thankful for having taken the right decision: it need not fear the judgement of history.
What hope is there of building anything with countries, or their leaders, who knowingly or otherwise make such errors of judgement? Although it wishes to reintegrate fully into NATO, France would perhaps be wise not to rush into the arms of a military organisation which enjoys no independence from the United States.
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