Chirac Scolding Angers Nations That Back U.S.
By CRAIG S. SMITH
NY Times
RUSSELS, Feb. 18 — "New Europe" barked back at "old
Europe" today, deepening the continental rift over
Iraq after President Jacques Chirac of France told
Central and Eastern European countries to keep their
views on Iraq to themselves or risk losing their
chance to join the European Union.
"We thought we were preparing for war with Saddam
Hussein and not Jacques Chirac," said Alexandr Vondra,
deputy foreign minister of the Czech Republic, one of
the European Union applicants that have drawn French
ire by openly supporting the United States and Britain
in the Iraqi crisis. Mr. Vondra said his country and
its immediate neighbors "definitely cannot remain
silent," as Mr. Chirac advised on Monday.
The French president, in an unusually emotional
outburst in Brussels after the European Union meeting
on Monday about Iraq, derided the Central and Eastern
European countries that have signed letters expressing
their support for the American policy on Iraq for
being "badly brought up," and having missed "an
opportunity to keep quiet."
All 13 candidates today endorsed the joint declaration
on Iraq issued on Monday by the 15 European leaders,
warning Saddam Hussein that he had "one last chance"
to disarm and vowing to "avoid new lines of division"
over European policy on Iraq.
But divisions exist. The war of words highlighted not
only disagreement over Iraq, but also France's
struggle for dominance in European affairs in the face
of an enlarging European Union whose incoming members
are historically beholden to the United States.
France has long been concerned that the former
Communist countries, indebted to the United States for
liberation from Soviet domination in the cold war,
would turn out to be a sort of Trojan horse bringing
America's influence into the union.
"For France, the European Union is a way for it to
remain a big power in the world because it can use
Europe to act and to have a certain influence in world
affairs that it can't have anymore on its own," said
Gilles Lepesant, a French expert on European identity
and Eastern Europe. France fears that expanding the
European Union membership will erode its influence and
weaken Europe's position as a potential counterweight
to American power.
The broader European Union membership is also more
likely to produce a decentralized organization that
leaves much power with national governments, rather
than the more centralized, cohesive union favored by
France and Germany.
The tension across Europe has grown steadily as
Central and Eastern European countries have sided with
the United States over how to resolve the Iraq crisis.
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld last month
chastised France and Germany for opposing the United
States, calling them "old Europe," out of step with
the "new Europe" made up of former Soviet bloc
countries.
While France this month recalled its gratitude to the
United States for liberation from Germany more than
half a century ago, the gratitude of former Communist
states toward Washington seems far more immediate and,
for now, binding. Even once rock-solid bonds like that
between Germany and the United States have been
undermined in recent months.
Andrzej Kapiszewski, professor of sociology and
political science at Krakow University in Poland,
recalled that even under communism, America remained a
benevolent presence. "I'm from Krakow, and practically
every single person had some relative in the United
States," Mr. Kapiszewski said.
There is little sense of obligation to Western Europe,
though, and some irritation at the long, difficult
negotiations insisted on by Western Europe for
membership of the European Union.
The East-West European divide broke into the open when
eight European leaders, including the European Union
candidates Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic,
signed a letter of support for Washington's position
in January. That letter was followed by another signed
by 10 more countries, including seven candidates for
the European Union.
The letters reinforced widespread suspicion in France
that the poorer European countries are primarily
attracted to European Union membership for economic
reasons while their political allegiance will remain
with Washington.
"Europe is not a cash register," warned Dominique de
Villepin, the French foreign minister, on Sunday.
In his comments on Monday, Mr. Chirac went on to
suggest that opposing France and Germany could hurt
candidates for European Union membership. He warned,
in particular, that Romania and Bulgaria, the poorest
of the thirteen candidates and the two that are still
negotiating to enter the bloc in 2007, "could hardly
find a better way" of reducing their chances for
membership by speaking up against France.
The French defense minister, Michele Alliot-Marie,
echoed Mr. Chirac in Warsaw today, telling her hosts
that "it was better to keep silent when you don't know
what's going on."
The comments were rejected across Central and Eastern
Europe on Tuesday, suggesting that France will face
serious challenges in exerting its influence over an
expanded European Union.
"France has a right to its opinion, and Poland has the
right to decide what is good for it," said Adam
Rotfeld, deputy foreign minister of Poland, the
largest of the candidates for the union. "France
should respect that."
Poland recently angered many European Union members by
choosing Lockheed Martin F-16 fighter jets over French
and Anglo-Swedish rivals.
The tensions between Poland and France are
particularly notable because the two countries have
traditionally been close. But President Bush is
clearly regarded, at least for now, as a better friend
to the Poles than President Chirac.
Charles Gati, a professor in European Studies at the
School of Advanced International Studies at Johns
Hopkins University, said nationalist sentiment in
countries that are candidates for the European Union
could now rise.
"This will strengthen nationalist arguments," Mr. Gati
said. "They will say the West is not only selfish but
divided, and we can't count on it."
Sorin Ionita, director of the Romanian Academic
Society, a leading think tank in Bucharest, said: "If
France wants to lose all the sympathy it has in the
East, this is the way to do it, to say you little guys
will have to listen to us forever. You don't hear this
kind of language from the United States."
Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain, who initiated
one of the controversial letters supporting
Washington, insisted today that the candidate
countries should not be silenced.
"They have as much right to speak up as Great Britain
or France or any other member of the European Union
today," Mr. Blair said.
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John D. Giorgis - [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Tonight I have a message for the brave and oppressed people of Iraq:
Your enemy is not surrounding your country — your enemy is ruling your
country. And the day he and his regime are removed from power will be
the day of your liberation." -George W. Bush 1/29/03
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