Posted on 01/24/2003 12:53:19 AM PST by MadIvan
US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld blasted France and Germany yesterday for failing to back military action against Iraq.
He dismissed them as “old Europe” and said their view on a possible war did not reflect that of other EU nations.
Here Political Editor TREVOR KAVANAGH looks at how France and Germany are trying to control Europe.
GERMANY worked hard under four Chancellors to repay its debt to history for two World Wars.
Its dynamic people settled for peace and democracy, and created Europe’s powerhouse economy.
Today, in just five years as Chancellor, Gerhard Schroeder has stained the German flag, sabotaged German integrity and pulled the plug on the German economy.
He is the joke of European politics, a vain man clinging to power at any price. That price is paid at home by 4 million jobless Germans.
It is also paid abroad as Germany’s painfully restored image is destroyed.
Schroeder, 58, sold his soul by clinging to power in a coalition with Greens. In return, he was forced to reject military action, even against a tyrant denounced by the UN.
Schroeder is a vain philanderer who sues anyone brave enough to suggest he dyes his hair or betrays his fourth wife.
He is so desperate for support that he has signed up to a shabby alliance with crooked French President Jacques Chirac.
The two men are playing a dangerous game for control of the EU.
And the greatest casualty looks like being euro-lover Tony Blair.
The Odd Couple have ganged up to carve up Europe and elbow Britain aside. Against Mr Blair’s wishes, they want a Franco-German Czar to run the expanded 25-member EU.
The Common Market was founded to stop another war in Europe. Baroness Thatcher was derided for warning Germany would one day use economic power to dominate the continent it could not rule by force.
Schroeder’s power grab — backed by Chirac — reawakens those fears.They want to take Mr Blair down a peg or two over his claim to be the bridge between the US and EU.
In a blatant bid to humiliate the PM, France has invited Zimbabwean tyrant Robert Mugabe to Paris — defying UK-backed sanctions.
Chirac, 70, is an unscrupulous political chancer. It is only because the Left failed to rally behind a credible candidate that he was not dumped as President last year.
Now he is “an old man in a hurry”, jumping on the Schroeder bandwagon in a bid to salvage his tawdry legacy. Meanwhile, Schroeder is using the EU power grab to divert voters’ attention from Germany’s economic slump.
Now there are fears the two mavericks plan to oust America from Nato and establish a Franco-German Europe as a rival to the USA.
Respected US newspaper columnist William Safire said: “The German design is apparently to separate Britain and the US from a federal Europe dominated by Germany and France — no wonder the British press catches a whiff of the old Berlin imperiousness.”
The French and Germans are paradoxically trying to increase their power, but are refusing to do the things, such as reforming their economies, which might actually have an impact in that regard. The result will be a mess, and we know how well both these countries react to those.
Regards, Ivan
After some masterful deception, the Germans massed against the British. The British held them in place in battle. Patton got through with his Corps to the South and disemboweled the Third Reich while the Germans couldn't counterattack adequately because of their fierce engagement with British Army. (A little, little bit because they had very little motor fuel, maybe!)
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