It would be a mistake to read too much into this. Polls are just political beauty contests. But clearly it’s a milestone on Chirac’s road to the title of Mr. Un-America. In the months since the Iraq crisis began, France has shrewdly positioned itself not so much as the enemy of the United States but as the standard-bearer for everyone on the globe who doesn’t share the Bush administration’s with-us-or-against-us world view. Righteous crusades against Evil, the French warned, can have evil consequences of their own. Even the best-intentioned occupiers of foreign lands will find themselves reviled by people anxious to control their own destinies.
How Gaulling, for the Americans, that the French could be proved right. When Paris tried to slow or stop America’s rush to invade Iraq–arguing that there were better ways than war to find Baghdad’s sup-posed weapons of mass destruction–it was denounced by Americans as petty and obstructionist. Nine months later, the French position looks prudent, even prescient. War has uncovered no WMD, and the cost in blood and treasure has been enormous.
Today France is at it again. Playing to the court of world opinion, it demands that the United States hand over Iraqi sovereignty to the Iraqis as soon as possible. Why? Though it speaks of empowering Iraqis, France really fears that America might stay in Iraq for the foreseeable (and unforeseeable) future. The United States isn’t giving in. Addressing the United Nations, President Bush declared that peace and stability could best be reached by “an orderly and democratic process… neither hurried nor delayed by other parties.” Turning Iraq over to the newly appointed and weak Governing Council, say U.S. officials, will only ensure chaos and instability.
As the French see it, the Americans are riding the proverbial tiger, afraid to dismount. “Things are not happening as they expected, to put it politely,” says one senior French official. “It’s in the interest of all Western democracies to change the course things are on. But the [U.S.] administration thinks it’s on a good track, that things are improving.” The French believe the longer the United States tries to hold on, the more humiliated–and angry–many Iraqis will feel. Some on the American side agree. “In a proud region, the Iraqis stand out,” says a member of the U.S. team that helped organize the Governing Council of 25 Iraqis. “Even the ones close to us are incredibly uncomfortable with being occupied. The more time goes by, the less support we’ll have.”
Late last week, in an attempt to win more international support for the occupation in the lead-up to a crucial donor’s conference in late October, Secretary of State Colin Powell announced a loose deadline of one year for Iraqis to write a constitution and move to elections. Bush also promised a bigger role for the United Nations–giving it a role in helping Iraqis write the constitution and supervise elections.
But Chirac is sticking with his more radical solution. Returning sovereignty to the Iraqi people right away, officially giving them “sole responsibility for their future,” would end (at least juridically) the humiliating U.S.-British occupation. Violence and hostility would subside, French officials argue. The United Nations and its national partners could get on with rebuilding Iraq’s administrative, security and financial institutions according to what Chirac called “a realistic calendar.”
There may be a compromise lurking here. Everyone recognizes that America would command the U.N.-mandated security force. The French are not contesting the legitimacy of the current Governing Council as the sovereign government of Iraq. “We ought to take that and run with it!” says a veteran of the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad. If the United Nations were given more authority in running Iraq, the French would probably agree to a more orderly and lengthy transition period. But relations between Paris and Washington are sufficiently bad that no one is looking to build a win-win solution. “A major obstacle to Chirac’s approach to sovereignty is that he is offering it,” says Simon Serfaty of Washington’s Center for Strategic and International Studies. After a 45-minute meeting between Chirac and Bush, the U.S. president was unmoved and Chirac insisted again, “We have to change tack.” So it’s on to round two at the United Nations this week. But unless France and the United States can come together, no one expects real progress.
