Analysis: Transatlantic tensions remain

George W Bush's visit to Europe to "extend the hand of friendship" has provoked a generally sceptical response in the French press, despite the welcome it has received from diplomats and politicians in France.

While few in France welcomed the re-election of Mr Bush for a second term as US president, Paris knows it must now do business with him.

But although Jacques Chirac seeks to play down past differences, that does not mean that French political analysts or journalists have forgotten or forgiven the attitudes in Washington that led to the rift over Iraq.

While the centre-right newspaper Le Figaro cites a French diplomatic source as saying the US president's hour-and-a-half-long dinner with the French president (their first meeting for several months) was friendly, the tone of French reports on it suggests there is still a vast and perhaps unbridgeable gulf between America and "old Europe" in their views on how best to run the world.

Mr Bush's speech in Brussels, says Le Figaro, had the bland taste of a reheated meal.

Limits of reconciliation

While French diplomats welcomed Mr Bush's new, second-term strategy of emphasising the US and Europe's shared values and goals - of spreading liberty and democracy - French journalists are more cutting about the differences in the two sides' motives and preferred methods for achieving these aims.

Le Figaro says Mr Bush may have the gift of selling himself to his own electorate, but it is a gift that does not travel well.

The newspaper says the meeting showed the limits of this reconciliation, with the two leaders' discussions on Syria and Iran revealing areas of considerable divergence.

And as for the personal chemistry, the paper reports that when asked whether he would be inviting Mr Chirac to his ranch, Mr Bush replied - not without irony - that he was "looking for a good cowboy".

It is not clear how that went down with Mr Chirac, whose personal relationship with Mr Bush has often been notoriously prickly - perhaps one reason why differences over Iraq escalated so quickly at the time.

France, says the centrist Le Monde, has long been seen by the White House as one of its most irritating allies - even if "French-bashing" (which it helpfully translates for the benefit of its French readers as "the denigration of all things French, much in vogue in the US in recent years") was not on the menu last night.

The left-wing Liberation says that despite Mr Bush's willingness to come and listen to his European allies, he still appears intent on a foreign policy that prefers military muscle to diplomacy - as in his dealings with Damascus and Tehran.

While there was Franco-American agreement on Lebanon, there is still divergence in the French and American positions on Hezbollah - which the US wants to ban as a terrorist organisation, a move France insists would be counter-productive, as Hezbollah remains a legitimate political party in Lebanon.

The real problem seems to be that while publicly the talk is all of unity, alliances and mending fences, the same issues that divided "old Europe" and the US administration over Iraq continue to bubble just below the surface.

Hurdles

While both sides know that the damage done by the disagreements over Iraq must be mended, especially now that the country is taking its first steps towards democracy, it is not going to be easy to sustain the bland agreements of this week when it comes to the next major difference on policy.

And for the French at least, the next potential hurdles are already all too clear.

Although there was accord, and even a joint statement, on Iran - saying it must not be allowed to produce nuclear weapons - it is clear to France that the US will not absolutely rule out military action, retaining more faith in the use of the threat of force to Europe's gentler diplomacy.

The US has real reservations about Europe's diplomatic efforts in Tehran, remaining keen to take the issue to the United Nations security council as soon as possible.

Likewise, even as Mr Bush welcomed the emergence of a strong, united Europe within the European Union in his Brussels speech, he made clear that he did not see the EU as a "counterweight" to the might of the US, something France has always made clear is the aim of building a larger, stronger Europe.

Meanwhile, Europe's plans to lift the arms embargo on China is another potential source of conflict with the US, along with the status of the International Criminal Court, the Kyoto climate treaty, the reform of the UN Security Council and America's plans to spread democracy in selected areas of the Middle East.

For the time being, France has accepted and reciprocated Mr Bush's hand of friendship.

But with so many areas of diverging opinion, the real test of this renewed alliance will be in the two sides' actions in the coming months, in response to the challenges posed by Iran, Syria and the wider war on terror.

By Caroline Wyatt BBC News, Paris
Published: 2005/02/22
© BBC MMV

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