Sarkozy ‘non’ to Blair EU presidency

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has withdrawn his support for former British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s bid to become the first president of the European Union, the BBC reports.

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The French Military Revolution

Newsweek International reports on France’s success in using small combat units to partner with different international military alliances.

“A year into his first term, in fact, French President Nicolas Sarkozy is using his warm relations with Washington and his military’s strong record fighting in Africa and the Balkans to help re-establish France publicly and formally as a leading player in NATO, more than four decades after President Charles de Gaulle pulled out of the alliance’s integrated command and kicked its offices out of Paris. At the same time, he’s working to put France at the fore of a separate European Union defense force and extend its influence eastward to the Persian Gulf and South Asia. And if France really wants to project itself on the world stage this way, well, it couldn’t happen at a better time. U.S. forces are stretched thin, and there are only a handful of other armies with the training, the bases, the organization and, most important, the political will to kill and die in far corners of the planet to keep local wars from emerging into global threats. The shortlist includes the Brits-and the French, and that’s about it.”

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Unverdiente Auszeichnung: Bürgermeister von Paris macht Sektenführer Dalai Lama zum Ehrenbürger

Wenn ein Mann von allen gehasst wird, muss man die Gründe dafür überprüfen. Wenn ein Mann von allen geliebt wird, muss man das auch überprüfen. (Konfuzius)

Die Galionsfigur der antichinesischen Propaganda im Westen, sprich der Sektenführer Dalai Lama, ist zum Ehrenbürger von Paris ernannt worden. Nur die Sozialisten und Grünen im Stadtrat  von Paris stimmten dafür, wie der französische Sender France Info berichtete.

Die Liberal-Konservativen um Nicolas Sarkozy verweigerten (zu Recht) die Abstimmung. Der Vorschlag des außenpolitisch unerfahrenen sozialistischen Bürgermeisters Bertrand Delanoë gefährdet das Fundament der bisher sehr guten französisch-chinesischen Beziehungen, und ist deshalb ein schwer wiegender politischer Fehler, weil sich Frankreichs Staatspräsident Nicolas Sarkozy derzeit um eine diplomatische Entspannung mit China bemüht, nachdem gewalttätige Dalai-Lama-Anhänger den olympischen Fackellauf in Paris gestört und dabei die 27-jährige chinesische Rollstuhl-Fechterin Jin Jin verletzt hatten.

Nicolas Sarkozy hat seinem chinesischen Amtskollegen Hu Jintao eine persönlich gewidmete Biografie des in China beliebten französischen Generals und Staatsmannes Charles De Gaulle geschenkt, sagte der ehemalige Premier Jean-Pierre Raffarin, der Zeitung Le Parisien. Dies sei ein Zeichen einer “Politik der Freundschaft”. “Die französische China-Politik ändert sich nicht”, fügte Raffarin hinzu. “Es gibt eine starke Bindung zwischen Frankreich und China.”

Jean-Pierre Raffarin, der mit Jacques Chirac als ausgewiesener Kenner und Liebhaber der chinesischen Kultur gilt und übermorgen Chinas Premier und Staatspräsidenten in Peking treffen wird, kritisierte aufs Schärfste die “unangemessene” Entscheidung des Stadtrats von Paris, den Dalai Lama zum Ehrenbürger zu ernennen. “Das ist eine rein lokale Angelegenheit ohne jede nationale Auswirkung.”

France returns to NATO’s military command

On the second day of the NATO summit in Bucharest, French President Nicolas Sarkozy indicated he intends to have France rejoin NATO’s military command, which it quit in 1966 under Général De Gaulle, and said he will make a formal decision by the end of the year. Nicolas Sarkozy also said France was prepared to deploy some 800 troops to eastern Afghanistan.

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The Future of European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP)

A report from the French think tank Institut français des relations internationales (IFRI) examines challenges facing EU defense policy and calls for an increased focus on counterterrorism and nation-building.

“The next few years will be crucial to determining which direction European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP) goes. Some factors will favor further growth and development.

First, the Lisbon ‘reform’ treaty should soon be ratified, introducing important new innovations to the EU’s Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and, more importantly, putting to rest the intra-EU quarrel that has impeded progress for the last five years.

Second, the divisions that arose over the Iraq War are fading, both Europe and the United States and within Europe itself. This should facilitate a more reasoned discussion of Europe’s role in global security.

Third, with the Iraq and Afghanistan wars continuing and a major presidential campaign underway, the United States has entered a period in which openness to independent European efforts is apt to increase, provided that these efforts are viewed as generally positive for the transatlantic relationship.

Fourth, the French presidency of the EU, which begins in June 2008, is very likely to attempt to push ESDP forward into a new phase.”

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The New French-British Brotherhood

NPR surveys press reaction on either side of the English Channel to French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s visit to Britain.

German broadcaster Deutsche Welle questions whether the meetings signify a marginalization of Berlin.

France and UK to press banks over more transparency

French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown made a joint push for greater regulation of European banks, calling for “full and immediate disclosure” of potentially bad debts.

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France’s Nuclear Diplomacy

Michelle Smith and Charles Ferguson evaluate Sarkozy’s nuclear deals in the Middle East, in the International Herald Tribune.

“The recent war games in the Gulf with France, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates are connected to French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s nuclear diplomacy. Sarkozy has been leveraging France’s leading civilian nuclear technology to gain diplomatic, commercial and military advantages with countries in the Middle East, as well parts of Africa and Asia. In response, nonproliferation experts have voiced their unease at the idea of exporting potentially nuclear bomb-usable technologies to proliferation-prone regions.”

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Nicolas Sarkozy et Jacques Chirac réunis pour l’hommage au dernier héros de la Grande Guerre

La République a rendu aujourd’hui un hommage solennel à Lazare Ponticelli, soldat et patriote français né en Italie et ultime poilu décédé à l’âge de 110 ans, ainsi qu’à ses 8,5 millions de camarades de la Première Guerre mondiale, dont 1,4 million furent tués lors de ce conflit, le premier du genre de l’histoire contemporaine de par son ampleur planétaire.

La cérémonie s’est déroulée à l’Hôtel national des Invalides, haut lieu de mémoire des armées de la France.

11 heures: Le cercueil de Lazare Ponticelli pénètre dans l’église Saint-Louis des Invalides, porté par onze légionnaires au képi blanc et encadré de quatre pionniers barbus au large tablier de cuir, hache sur l’épaule, appartenant au 3e régiment étranger d’infanterie, héritier du 4e régiment de marche de la Légion étrangère où avait servi Lazare Ponticelli. Une minute de silence est observée dans les administrations et les drapeaux mis en berne sur les bâtiments publics.

Sous les ors de “l’Eglise des soldats”, 500 personnes suivent les obsèques religieuses, dont le président Nicolas Sarkozy et son prédécesseur et ancien mentor Jacques Chirac.

12 heures: Le cercueil est acheminé vers la cour d’honneur entre une double haie de membres de l’association “Le Poilu d’Epernay”, fusil Lebel à la main, revêtant l’uniforme français de 1915: casque d’acier Adrian, capote, pantalon et bandes molletières en drap bleu horizon, brodequins de cuir. L’académicien et ancien homme politique Max Gallo, lui aussi fils d’immigrés italiens, prononce alors une allocution émouvante évoquant avec prestance les faits d’armes de Lazare Ponticelli qui “nous rend fiers, par toute sa vie, d’être son frère humain”.

12 heures 45: La “Marche funèbre” de Chopin accompagne le pas des légionnaires qui portent le cercueil vers la sortie. Il sera inhumé cinq heures plus tard, dans l’intimité, dans le caveau familial du cimetière d’Ivry-sur-Seine.

15 heures 40: Nicolas Sarkozy pénètre seul sous le Dôme des Invalides. Près du tombeau en bronze du maréchal Ferdinand Foch, généralissime des armées alliées à la fin de la Grande Guerre, il dépose une gerbe devant une plaque dévoilée par deux collégiens.

La plaque porte les mots suivants: “Alors que disparaît le dernier combattant français de la première guerre mondiale, la Nation témoigne sa reconnaissance envers ceux qui ont servi sous ses drapeaux en 1914-1918. La France conserve précieusement le souvenir de ceux qui restent dans l’Histoire comme les Poilus de la Grande Guerre”.

16 heures: Dans une longue allocution, le président de la République Nicolas Sarkozy déclare notamment: “En cet instant, dans toute la France, la pensée de chacun se tourne vers ces femmes et ces hommes qui nous ont appris la grandeur du patriotisme qui est l’amour de son pays et la détestation du nationalisme qui est la haine des autres”.

17 heures: La cérémonie s’achève. Le choeur de l’Armée française interprète “La Madelon”, le chant des poilus.

Le 11 novembre 2006, René Riffaud avait été le seul survivant de la «Grande Guerre» à se rendre sous l’Arc de Triomphe pour la commémoration de l’Armistice. Crédits photo: Euler/AFP

French President Nicolas Sarkozy attacks Iran for its stance on Israel

French President Nicolas Sarkozy told Jewish community in Paris he would refuse to greet any world leader who refused to recognize Israel - a remark apparently ruling out any face-to-face meetings with Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Nicolas Sarkozy made the off-the-cuff remark in a speech to the French-Jewish community in which he reaffirmed his strong support for international sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program.

“I won’t shake hands with people who refuse to recognize Israel,” Nicolas Sarkozy declared at an annual event hosted by the Representative Council of Jewish Organizations in France (CRIF).

Nicolas Sarkozy announced he would visit Israel in May to mark the 60th anniversary of Israel’s founding after a March visit to Paris by Israel President Shimon Peres.

© Ynet and Reuters

France’s new Kulturkampf

Newsweek International reports on the tendency of French President Nicolas Sarkozy to mix messages about policy and religion and says Sarkozy has drawn fire from some of France’s traditional secularists.

” ‘A man who believes is a man who hopes,’ said the president. ‘And the interest of the republic is that there be a lot of men and women who hope.’ He advocated a new ‘positive secularism’ that ‘doesn’t consider religions a danger, but an asset.’ And he declared, ‘In the transmission of values and in the teaching of the difference between good and evil, the schoolteacher will never be able to replace the priest or the pastor.’

Those are fighting words in strictly secular France. Suddenly, faith, once an entirely private affair, has infused the president’s political discourse. In Riyadh on January 14, Sarkozy referenced the Lord 13 times in a speech to Saudi Arabia’s Consultative Council, evoking a ‘transcendent God who is in the thoughts and the heart of every man.’ That was news to France’s estimated 15 million atheists and agnostics, a quarter of the country.”

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French president Nicolas Sarkozy’s erratic public and personal life

Love Gained, Love Lost

by Anne Applebaum, Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist, member of the editorial board of the Washington Post

Washington, February 5, 2008

Enfin, the rumors confirmed! Last weekend, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France married his singer-supermodel sweetheart, Carla Bruni, in a 20-minute civil ceremony at the Elysée Palace, the French White House. A city official performed the service. The bridal party consisted of family members plus one or two fashionable friends. Apparently the bride wore white.

Somehow, though, the first French presidential nuptials since 1931 were not an entirely joyous national event.

Though a few people tried to say something nice about the wedding–”C’est formidable,” declared Bernadette Chirac, ex-first lady of France–the Sarkozy-Brunis woke up the following morning to news that the nation did not approve: Already on a downward trajectory, support for Sarkozy’s presidency has plunged. From a high of 67 percent last July, Sarkozy’s support in France had dropped to 54 percent in January. As of yesterday, this number had slipped to 41 percent, with more than three-quarters of the French pronouncing themselves annoyed by their head of state’s very public private life, in polling done before and after the presidential nuptials. For a country that treated news of Sarkozy’s divorce last year with a shrug of Gallic indifference, this is incredible.

True, this news did follow a flurry of new photographs of Bruni–sorry, Madame la Presidente–in various stages of undress (including some suspiciously recent pictures of the new first lady wearing nothing but black leather boots and a wedding ring). Nevertheless, I don’t believe that a hitherto undiscovered French prudishness is driving the surge of popular annoyance. The fact is that the private peccadilloes of a public figure loom largest when they seem to confirm his or her other character flaws. The Monica Lewinsky affair hurt Bill Clinton because it reminded everyone of the president’s reputation for political slipperiness. Sarkozy’s whirlwind romance is damaging because it reminds everyone that his public behavior is no less wacky and unpredictable than his private life.

Certainly this is true on the international stage, and especially in Europe, where diplomacy normally moves at the sedate pace of a Viennese waltz and where Sarkozy’s penchant for whirling off in all directions at once is, shall we say, unsettling. Indeed, “controlling Sarko,” as one Scandinavian politician put it to me, has now become a task for the entire European diplomatic corps.

At times this requires straightforward damage control: The French president seems, for example, to be obsessed by Turkey, whose accession to the European Union he wants to prevent at all costs. Allegedly he reads his foreign ministry’s Turkey dossiers personally and intervenes to prevent any language suggesting possible Turkish membership from appearing in any official document. Since barring Turkey isn’t actually E.U. policy yet, others are left to pick up the pieces.

But his colleagues have enough work just keeping track of him. Since becoming president, Sarkozy has opened a new military base in the United Arab Emirates, conducted (unsuccessful) peace negotiations in Lebanon, invited Moammar Gaddafi to Paris (where the Libyan leader cheerfully told the press he had not discussed any human rights issues with his French host) and promoted French nuclear energy technology while simultaneously pushing Iran to halt its own nuclear development. So far he’s visited some 20 countries. One French newspaper gleefully quoted King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia declaring that “President Sarkozy resembles a dashing and high-spirited thoroughbred, but like all thoroughbreds, he should submit to be reined in to find his balance.”

Sarkozy’s domestic policies reach in multiple directions, too. One bemused British columnist records that the French president has, since coming to office, “decided to launch a ‘Marshall plan’ for the suburbs, to ban advertisements on state television, to found 10 universities, to reform the 35-hour week, to protect French banks from sovereign wealth funds . . . and to tax mobile phones.” Sarkozy has also asked the economist Amartya Sen to find a way of including “quality of life” in French statistics, the philosopher Edgar Morin to outline a renaissance in the “politics of civilization” and the socialist Jacques Attali to come up with “300 decisions for changing France.”

Maybe this whirlwind of hyperactivity will eventually add up to something; certainly it makes a welcome change from the somnolence of the later Chirac years. But it definitely provides an uneasy context for a public romance. If Sarkozy were a staid and predictable politician, his tabloid love affair and abrupt marriage might be joyously embraced by a dewy-eyed nation. In present circumstances, it looks like one more madcap adventure to add to the growing list.

Reprinted with kindly permission of The American Enterprise Institute.

Le président du Conseil constitutionnel estime que la fonction présidentielle exige «une certaine retenue»

L’étalage public de la vie privée du Président de la République Nicolas Sarkozy irrite jusque sous les lambris du Palais-Royal, siège du Conseil constitutionnel, autorité suprême de la République.

Le président du Conseil constitutionnel, Jean-Louis Debré, proche de Jacques Chirac, estime qu’il faut «faire attention à ne pas désacraliser les fonctions officielles». “À partir du moment où vous avez reçu une mission du peuple, quelle que soit cette mission, il y a une certaine tenue à avoir”, confiait en substance Jean-Louis Debré, le 3 février 2008, à l’antenne de la radio de la communauté juive de Paris Radio-J, faisant allusion au tapage médiatique consécutif à l’annonce du mariage de Nicolas Sarkozy avec la célébrité de la jet-set Carla Bruni.

“Quand on regarde l’histoire du pays, aussi bien de Gaulle, Pompidou, Giscard, Mitterrand, Chirac, ont eu une certaine conception de leur rôle de président de la République, et cette conception était avec une certaine retenue. Ils incarnaient, ils incarnent la France”, ajoute Jean-Louis Debré.

“Je pense qu’il y a une certaine attitude à avoir quand on représente tous les Français et quand on incarne la France”, a-t-il poursuivi, tout en se défendant de “porter un jugement” sur Nicolas Sarkozy.

Nicolas Sarkozy’s New Western Idea

Newsweek International examines the legacy French President Nicolas Sarkozy seems to want to create: one focused on strong trans-Atlantic relations, unabashedly Christian, but equally defined by warm relations with Muslim countries.

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Gespräch mit dem französischen Historiker Jean Lacouture zur Lage Frankreichs

Die Weltwoche druckt ein Gespräch mit dem französischen Historiker Jean Lacouture ab, der eine ziemlich düstere Zukunft für Frankreich voraussieht:

“Wir sind immerhin noch in einer Demokratie. Aber wir glorifizieren die Führung, und wenn die Führung mittelmässig ist, geht es uns nicht gut. Man wird jetzt sehen müssen, wie es mit Sarkozy läuft. Aber wir befinden uns in einem Zustand der Dekadenz. Wir befinden uns auch in einem ästhetischen Tief. Wir befinden uns in einer politischen, wirtschaftlichen und kulturellen Krise. [...] Ich glaube, dass er abstürzen wird. Und wir werden darunter leiden. [...] Er ist ein Mann, der supertalentiert ist, supertalentiert. Er ist ausserordentlich intelligent, eloquent, mutig, er hat eine grosse Energie, aber er ist verrückt.”

Vollständiges Gespräch lesen.

Nicolas Sarkozy, Meister der medialen Inszenierung

In der Neuen Zürcher Zeitung schreibt Marc Zitzmann über Frankreichs Staatspräsident Nicolas Sarkozy, und sucht in  neuen Publikation nach Antwort auf die Frage, was der Sarkozysmus sei.

“Mit ungleich mehr Gewinn liest sich da «Le Téléprésident» von François Jost und Denis Muzet (Éditions de l’Aube). Kernthese dieses «Essai sur un pouvoir médiatique» ist, dass mit Sarkozy «erstmals ein Präsident eine Methode zum System erhebt, deren Ziel es ist, das Handeln und die Kommunikation über dieses Handeln aufs Engste zu verbinden».

Die Nähe des Staatsoberhaupts zu Medienmoguln, seine Selbstdarstellung als Zelebrität und sein von Jost und Muzet als «telepopulistisch» charakterisiertes Weltbild wurden schon oft thematisiert. Faszinierend und zugleich verstörend ist dagegen die mit Argumenten und Beispielen gestützte These, Sarkozys Kommunikationspolitik (und seine Politik tout court) sei von A bis Z für die Flimmerkiste formatiert.

Die sehr diversen Konsumenten der «Fast News» bediene der «Telepräsident» jeden Tag mit einer anderen «Postkarte», die jeweils einer spezifischen Zielgruppe zugeeignet sei: «Nach Sarkozy bei Airbus, Sarkozy im Krankenhaus folgt Sarkozy bei den Feuerwehrleuten, Sarkozy bei den Hochseefischern.» Die Sequenzierung in täglich neue, in sich abgeschlossene Episoden verleihe der präsidentiellen Kommunikation den Charakter einer Fernsehserie.”

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French Television Revolution

French President Nicolas Sarkozy announced he will pull the plug on the country’s nascent English language television project, France 24, roughly a year after its launch.

In a new plan, Nicolas Sarkozy says he intends to merge France 24 and another station, TV5Monde, to set up a public, French-language, “policy of civilization” station that he hopes will rival the BBC in influence.

France: Europe’s Counterterrorist Powerhouse

A report from the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute (AEI) argues France is becoming Europe’s “counterterrorism powerhouse” due to ramped up efforts.

by Gary J. Schmitt and Reuel Marc Gerecht

Washington - November 1, 2007

Counterterrorism, like espionage and covert action, is not a spectator sport. The more a country practices, the better it gets. France has become the most accomplished counterterrorism practitioner in Europe. None of the western European counterterrorism officials we have met with over the last eighteen months would dissent from this view.

And while there may be a debate about which European state has had the most experience dealing with terrorism–be it Germany with its Baader-Meinhof Group, Italy with its Red Brigades, Spain with the Basque separatist group Euskadi Ta Askatasuna, or even Great Britain with the Irish Republican Army–there is no question that France has had as much experience with the most virulent, police-resistant forms of modern terrorism as any of them. Whereas September 11, 2001, was a heart-stopping shock to the American counterterrorism establishment–and only slightly less revolutionary for many in Europe–it was not a révolution des mentalités in Paris.

Two waves of terrorist attacks, the first in the mid-1980s and the second in the mid-1990s, have made France acutely aware of both state-supported Middle Eastern terrorism and freelance but organized Islamic extremists. The attacks in 1985 and 1986 were probably Iranian-inspired, carried out as payback for France’s military and financial support of Saddam Hussein. The attacks in the 1990s, however, in part an outgrowth of the Algerian civil war, clearly revealed to French security officials that “proper” Frenchmen, les français de souche, could convert to Islam, and that Muslims raised in France could spearhead mass-casualty terrorism.

By comparison, the security services in Great Britain and Germany were slow to awaken to the threat from homegrown radical Muslims. Britain gambled that its multicultural approach to immigrants was superior to France’s forced assimilationist model. But with the discovery of one terrorist plot after another being planned by British Muslims, as well as the deadly transportation bombings that took place in London on July 7, 2005, British public and security officials have begun to question the wisdom of their “Londonistan” approach to Muslim integration. Similarly, until recently, officials in Berlin believed that Germany was safe from homegrown Muslim terrorism, but two major bomb plots over the past year and a half–one aimed at German trains, the other at American military personnel, installations, and interests in Germany–have raised serious doubts in the minds of many German security officials about that previous assumption.

French scholars and journalists have also been way ahead of their European and American counterparts in dissecting Islamic extremism and jihadism, and in analyzing the “Zacarias Moussaoui” phenomenon of European-raised Muslim militants and terrorists. And French officials, who work in counterterrorism domestically and overseas, appear to be well aware of this intellectual spade work, often maintaining friendly relationships with scholars and journalists working in the field. The French interior ministry and prison system, for example, were remarkably open and helpful to the renowned Franco-Iranian sociologist Farhad Khosrokhavar in his interviews of jailed al Qaeda members. Khosrokhavar’s research, which produced the untranslated Quand Al-Qaida parle: Témoignages derrière les barreaux (When al Qaeda Speaks: Testimonies from Behind Bars) is the most insightful look into the mind and manners of highly westernized, Europeanized members of al Qaeda. Nothing in the American literature comes close to dissecting the nature of al Qaeda’s westernized elite. Given the distance and stiffness between the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and American scholars and journalists, it is unlikely that Khosrokhavar will soon have any American competition.

The Marsaud Report, issued on November 22, 2005, by a special parliamentary commission charged with examining France’s counterterrorism capacities, articulates the general French view of the threat posed by radical Islamic terrorism. It is perhaps the most cogent statement yet by an official European governing organization on why its citizens are inextricably involved in the fight against radical Islamic terrorism and unavoidably tied to the United States.

The absence of Islamist attacks on French soil since 9/11 should not be misinterpreted: it does not signify at all that France has been immunized from such actions, notably because of its position on the Iraq conflict. Elsewhere, we have already indicated that terrorist cells have been taken apart [since 9/11]–cells which were planning attacks on our soil. Further, outside of our national territory, French targets were struck, like the May 8, 2002, attack in Karachi, which killed fourteen, of whom eleven were employees of the DCN [Direction des Constructions Navales, France’s major shipbuilder], or the attack against the oil tanker Limburg off the coast of Yemen on October 6, 2002. France is an integral part of Western civilization, a target of radical Islamic terrorists. In this regard, she figures among the potential targets of these terrorists to the same extent as any other Western nation. A member of the international coalition in Afghanistan, where our special forces participate in the hunt of al Qaeda’s leaders, France is thus considered an enemy, no matter her position on Iraq. Furthermore, France has been since 1986 on the cutting edge of countering [Middle Eastern] terrorism: her contribution in dismantling networks and her central role in the international counterterrorist effort have made her undeniably an enemy of international terrorist groups. Additionally, France must take into consideration her geographic position and her history. It has been clearly shown that France is the target of choice for the Algerian GSPC [the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat].

After 9/11, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the FBI decided to headquarter America’s premier European counterterrorism liaison shop in Paris because they recognized–despite the acrimony arising from the run-up to the Iraq war and the historical coolness between the CIA and French intelligence–that France is the European country most serious about counterterrorism.

French Lessons

It is unclear what practical lessons Americans can draw from the French encounter with Islamic terrorism, given the two countries’ different histories of interaction with the Muslim world and the significant differences between the two when it comes to legal systems and the domestic purview of the state. Nonetheless, it is always worth knowing how others do things–especially other democracies–when what they do seems to work.

And one of the things the French do well–and perhaps the hardest thing for Americans to appreciate, let alone adopt–is granting highly intrusive powers to their internal security service, the Direction de la Surveillance du Territoire (DST), and to their counterterrorist investigative magistrates (juges d’instruction). The latter institution is the linchpin of France’s counterterrorism prowess, allowing the French to combine the powers of prevention, deterrence, and punishment in one individual. This office, created after 1986, has no American parallel and in its powers seems to be unique within Europe. They oversee and often direct the investigative reach of France’s myriad police services, especially the intelligence unit of the French national police, the Renseignments Généraux and the DST.

This direction is exercised through a distinctly French combination of administrative statutes and–just as important–informal institutional and personal relations. The juges d’instruction do not have the authority to command the DST, which belongs formally under the authority of the interior minister. But because of the success of such magistrates as Jean-Louis Bruguière and Jean-François Ricard, who proved that they could handle sensitive information collected by a domestic intelligence agency, the DST has essentially formalized its relationship with these magistrates. The juges d’instruction can now direct DST operations and intelligence collection.

The political class in Paris, often at odds with the judicial class, has grown comfortable with the independence exercised by these investigative magistrates. A cynic might say that this reflects the political sensitivity of the terrorism portfolio–better that magistrates handle the potential blowback from these cases than elected officials. But it is also an acknowledgement of how effectively and professionally the juges d’instruction have conducted themselves since 1986.

These magistrates and their offices have become the repositories of counterterrorism information in the French government. The advantage over the American system here is significant: counterterrorism personnel at the FBI, Justice Department, CIA, and National Security Council usually rotate out of the terrorism portfolio after a few years. Few could be said to have monitored specific cases and particular Islamist organizations for years on end. Bruguière, France’s most famous juge, stayed on the counterterrorism beat for over twenty-five years and could overwhelm his interlocutors with details and insights that come only from long-standing first-hand experience. These magistrates have become, as Jeremy Shapiro and Bénédicte Suzan have pointed out in their incisive evaluation of the juges d’instruction, their own counterterrorism intelligence services.

Observers are struck by the ability of the French to concentrate the combined resources of the state quickly. From the substantial use of wiretaps and other forms of electronic interception to day-and-night physical surveillance and “preventive detention” that can be directed against targets about whom authorities do not have sufficient evidence to seek criminal prosecution, magistrates and their allied police and intelligence services can rapidly monitor, harass, and paralyze those they suspect of terrorist activity. As the French 2006 white paper on domestic security and terrorism states:

To be effective, a judicial system for counterterrorism must combine a preventive element, whose objective is to prevent terrorists from acting, and a repressive element, to punish those who commit attacks as well as their organizers and accomplices. The French system follows this logic. But its originality and strength lie in the fact that the barrier between prevention and punishment is not airtight.

The juges d’instruction have largely demolished this wall.

The French have other important counterterrorism agencies. Foremost among them are the Conseil de Sécurité Intérieure (Internal Security Council), chaired by the French president or his representative, which “defines the orientation for domestic security policy and establishes priorities.” The prime minister chairs the Comité Interministériel du Renseignement (Interministerial Intelligence Committee), which brings together all of the ministers involved in counterterrorism. The interior ministry leads the Comité Interministériel de Lutte Antiterroriste (Interministerial Counterterrorist Committee), which coordinates actions at the ministerial level.

Most important is the Unité de Coordination de la Lutte Antiterroriste (Counterterrorist Coordination Unit), which was created in 1984 inside the interior ministry. This office collects information supplied by all the other agencies, including the interior ministry, the defense ministry, and the ministry of economy, finance, and industry.

As noted by Shapiro and Suzan:

Previously, no single service had specialized in terrorism and thus no one was responsible for assembling a complete picture from the various different institutional sources, for assuring information flows between the various agencies, or for providing coordinated direction to the intelligence and police services for the prevention of terrorism.

None of these organizations and offices is of course uniquely French. We certainly could not conclude that they operate more efficiently than their American counterparts–excepting the greater efficiency one would expect to find in a smaller, highly centralized state. What sets France apart are its juges d’instruction and their ability to harness the country’s enormous police resources. These magistrates are also able, because of their singular focus, to keep the counterterrorism apparatus in France operating with an esprit and at a tempo other countries find hard to match, especially as 9/11 recedes into distant memory. The French themselves are not deluded about their capacities: the counterterrorism white paper notes that “the threat now develops almost invisibly and is much more difficult for the intelligence and security agencies to detect.”

French officials are confident, however, in what the French state, properly focused on an internal enemy, can do.

We underscore the power of the French state since so much post-Patriot Act commentary in the United States suggests that enhanced police powers–for example, the sequestration of terrorist suspects without immediate access to attorneys, or the use of wiretapping and physical surveillance that falls far short of “probable cause” of Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) standards–are counterproductive to counterterrorism efforts since they corrode our collective trust in the law and are ineffective in any case.

We are uncomfortable with some French counterterrorism practices–such as the government’s ability to jail French citizens without sufficient grounds for actually taking them to court–and would not want to see them imported to the United States. Some in France worry that police power, when focused on the Muslim community, can become overbearing and counterproductive.

The French national police and the DST are conscious of this concern. We suspect that the presence of Muslim Frenchmen in the police and domestic intelligence services–larger, it appears, than in any other European country–allows French officials to track this concern, as well as deploy a more effective counterterrorism cadre, better able to penetrate police-resistant radical Muslim circles. In any case, anxiety about police intrusiveness still appears to be a minority opinion in France, both among officials and in the wider population.

Transatlantic Parallels

It is worthwhile to mention a critical study of Franco-American counterterrorism relations commissioned by the policy planning staff of the French foreign ministry. Entitled The Counterterrorist Effort in France and the United States: Beyond the Celebration of Our Cooperation, Are There Long-Term Structural Problems?, its critique is pessimistic.

France’s highly codified legal system, in which the French state enjoys enormous powers of intrusion and coercion, does not resemble the messier U.S. system of separated powers, judicial independence, and presumptive rights held by individuals against the government. The censure in the piece, which likely represents the views of much of the French elite, is more procedural than moral. America’s legal and political system, at least under George W. Bush, could not handle such “extralegal” challenges as Guantanamo, extraordinary rendition, or warrantless surveillance. According to the authors of the report, the United States got hoisted by its own petard by making the struggle against radical Islamic extremism into a highly politicized, militarily front-loaded “war on terror” that its legal and ethical system could not handle.

We can agree with some of this critique–for example, we do not think the Bush administration effectively thought through the judicial and legal challenges it would encounter as it interrogated and imprisoned members and suspected members of al Qaeda, the Taliban, and other extremist Islamic groups. But the stabilizing genius of American government is its extremely open political system, in which convulsive questions can be asked and debated, and bipartisan consensus can usually be found on serious matters of national security. The Bush administration, reflecting the desire of all presidents to protect executive prerogatives they deem necessary to wage war successfully, got itself into a difficult spot with aspects of the “war on terror” precisely because it did not allow politics to intervene early enough on the thorny–at times gut-wrenching–questions of how to interrogate, imprison, and eliminate “enemy combatants.” The French political and legal system does notdo debate easily; if allowed, the American system does it sublimely well.

These “procedural” challenges, which torment some of our allies, are unlikely to seriously affect our counterterrorism cooperation with Paris. Throughout the run-up to the Iraq war, which was perhaps the nadir of post-World War II Franco-American relations, counterterrorism cooperation blossomed. In 2007, Nicolas Sarkozy, who openly admires much about the United States and rarely engages in the anti-American cynicism so common among the French intellectual elite, was elected president. Unless he has been hiding his true feelings–something he is not known for doing–Sarkozy does not seem to believe the United States has been ethically deficient since 9/11. We suspect that many in France, especially those in its intelligence and security services, understand the unique challenges the United States confronted after 9/11–the challenges that only a global military power could confront.

In the end, looking at the French and American approaches to counterterrorism provides an odd symmetry. In the case of France, the threat is largely–but not simply–within the confines of its own borders. To meet the threat, the French are willing to give their officials what we would consider extraordinary powers and discretion. In the case of the United States, the terrorist threat comes largely–but not solely–from abroad. To meet that threat, President Bush has used his power as commander in chief to its fullest. And while his political opponents and a few judges criticize the use of that power, for the most part, Americans have not reacted in a manner that suggests that they see a darkening, dangerous shadow over their personal liberties. Similarly, since 1986, when French domestic counterterrorism became much more intrusive–when Judge Bruguière’s distinctly un-Anglo-Saxon mission began–France has not gone down the slippery slope into tyranny. France’s society, its politics, andmany of its laws have actually become much more liberal and open.

As a practical matter, there will always be a trade-off of sorts between citizen liberties and the powers a state needs to fight certain threats. Yet it is the paramount duty of any liberal democracy not only to protect the rights associated with a decent political order, but also to protect the lives of its citizens. Exercising power in the name of security is not necessarily illiberal. And as our examination of the French approach to counterterrorism suggests, the exercise of such power can be considerable indeed. It is a point that some liberal and civil libertarian critics of the Bush administration, who too rarely study what is going on abroad, might do well to remember.

Reprinted with kindly permission of the American Enterprise Institute.

Qaddafi-Sarkozy Meetings

Libya’s President Muammar Qaddafi met with French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris yesterday, in Qaddafi’s first state visit to France in more than three decades. The talks focused around economic cooperation and arms trade.

The talks also set off protest in Paris, with some members of Sarkozy’s cabinet objecting to the president’s welcoming of Qaddafi, and Parisians upset over the terms of possible trade deals between the countries.

Meanwhile, Senator Hillary Clinton, with six other senators, sent a letter yesterday asking Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice to urge Libya to compensate victims of the 1988 Pan Am 103 bombing and the 1986 bombing of a discotheque in Berlin. Libya agreed to pay the victims in 2003, but has yet to fulfill that obligation, the letter says.

Check out also our story from August 2007: France and Libya sign arms deal.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s speech to the American Jewish Committee

Watch French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s recent, stirring speech on anti-Semitism to the American Jewish Committee (AJC), with full English translation, at FORA.tv, the internet’s leading website for international opinion-makers and diplomacy.

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American Jewish Committee honors Nicolas Sarkozy with Light Unto the Nations Award

Washington D.C. - November 7, 2007 - French President Nicolas Sarkozy was honored  by the American Jewish Committee (AJC) with the global advocacy organization’s prestigious Light Unto the Nations Award.

“Above all, we honor President Sarkozy’s conviction, conscience, and courage - qualities that are in short supply in a world desperately in need of all three,” said AJC Executive Director David A. Harris.

The AJC award pays tribute to outstanding statesmanship.

“President Nicolas Sarkozy is a man of passion,” said David A. Harris. “It is his passion, combined with his conviction, conscience, and courage, that has quickly elevated him to a place of exceptional prominence and respect on the global stage.”

Richard J. Sideman, AJC National President, opening the meeting and award ceremony, saluted President Sarkozy’s “unparalleled vigor and uncommon principle,” and spoke of the common challenges and threats facing the “sister democracies” of the United States of America, France and Israel.

President Nicolas Sarkozy, thanking AJC, spoke forcefully against antisemitism and in support of Israel’s quest for peace and security.

“Antisemitism must be attacked head on,” declared President Nicolas Sarkozy. “Once you try to explain antisemitism, you are rationalizing antisemitism.”

He said antisemitism is a reality that must be acknowledged, not denied. “We cannot fight against what is denied,” he said. “Unless you agree on a diagnosis, you cannot find the remedy.”

President Nicolas Sarkozy described himself as a committed friend of Israel who regards the very creation of the state as one of the “miracles” of the twentieth century.

The French president expressed optimism about advancing Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations. When Israelis and Palestinians have “their backs against the wall, the only thing they can do is move forward,” he said.

Pledging the support of his government to help negotiations for a viable two-state solution, President Sarkozy pointed out that “the issue of security is non-negotiable” for Israel, adding that “Israel has its back to the sea and little room to maneuver.”

President Sarkozy also touched on Lebanon and Iran in his remarks. “Lebanon is a symbol of diversity in a part of the world that needs to learn that purity of fundamentalism is a risk,” said the French president.

Referring to the efforts to assimilate successfully France’s own Muslim population, President Sarkozy said, “Muslim countries cannot say diversity is necessary in France, and not on the other side of the Mediterranean.” Such diversity in Lebanon in particular helps explain why “France is committed to Lebanon,” he said.

He reiterated France’s determined opposition to the development by Iran of nuclear weapons technology, while expressing support for nations that seek to develop nuclear energy for solely peaceful purposes. “Iran has the right to civil nuclear power,” he said. President Sarkozy said that he had called for France’s political and economic policies to be harmonized in sending a strong message to Iran that France opposes any nuclear-weapons program there.

AJC and France have enjoyed close and cooperative relations for more than 50 years. The ties to President Nicolas Sarkozy have evolved strongly since he served as Interior Minister and addressed AJC in Washington three years ago.

“He is steadfast in his opposition to anti-Semitism,” said David A. Harris, recalling President Nicolas Sarkozy’s words at a 2004 AJC luncheon in Washington, when he declared: “I consider any insult against Jews an insult against France.”

The Light Unto the Nations Award was given to President Nicolas Sarkozy, the inscription states, “in admiration of your tireless promotion of democratic values, human rights, and peace, and in appreciation for your devoted friendship with the United States, Israel and the Jewish people.”

The award is in the shape of a flame, symbolic of the inextinguishable light of freedom. Previous recipients of the award include U.S. President Bill Clinton and Chilean President Ricardo Lagos.

More than one hundred guests attended the private AJC breakfast with President Nicolas Sarkozy, including senior AJC leaders, representatives of other national Jewish organizations, Members of the U.S. Congress, prominent civic leaders and senior French government officials.

Several members of President Sarkozy’s Cabinet accompanied the president, including Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, who addressed an AJC dinner in New York last month; Justice Minister Rachida Dati; Economy Minister Christine Lagarde; Rama Yade, State Secretary for Foreign Affairs and Human Rights; and Bernard Accoyer, president of the National Assembly. Richard Prasquier, president of the CRIF, the umbrella French civic Jewish organization, was among the guests.

Valérie Hoffenberg, AJC director in Paris, who helped arrange the event, is a member of the president’s official delegation visiting Washington, D.C., this week.

Can the President overrule the People?: France and the EU Reform Treaty

World Politics Review notes that the terms of the EU reform treaty approved last week in Lisbon remains unpopular among French voters. It examines the legal implications of President Nicolas Sarkozy ignoring the will of his people in voting to pass the treaty.

Read full story.