Wimps, weasels and monkeys - the US media view of 'perfidious France'

Guardian ^ | 2/11/03 | Gary Younge in New York and Jon Henley in Paris

[kattracks]

The "petulant prima donna of realpolitik" is leading the "axis of weasels", in "a chorus of cowards". It is an unholy alliance of "wimps" and ingrates which includes one country that is little more than a "mini-me minion", another that is in league with Cuba and Libya, with a bunch of "cheese-eating surrender monkeys" at the helm.

Welcome to Europe, as viewed through the eyes of American commentators and newspapers yesterday, as Euro-bashing, and particularly anti-French sentiment, reached new heights. In a barrage of insults and invective which ranged from the basest tabloid rants to the loftiest columnists on the most respected newspapers, European-led resistance to America's war plans in Iraq was portrayed not as a diplomatic position to be negotiated as a genetic weakness in the European mindset which makes them reluctant to fight wars and incapable of winning them.

The front page of Rupert Murdoch's New York Post yesterday shows the graves of Normandy with the headline: "They died for France but France has forgotten." "Where are the French now, as Americans prepare to put their soldiers on the line to fight today's Hitler, Saddam Hussein?" asks the pugnacious columnist Steve Dunleavy. "Talking appeasement. Wimping out. How can they have forgotten?" A cartoon in the same paper shows an ostrich with its head in the sand below the words: "The national bird of France."

If such language is proving a headache for the diplomats, then spare a thought for the French translators, who have struggled for words to convey the full force of the venom. "Cheese-eating surrender monkeys" - a phrase coined by Bart Simpson but made acceptable in official diplomatic channels around the globe by Jonah Goldberg, a columnist for the rightwing weekly National Review (according to Goldberg) - was finally rendered: " Primates capitulards et toujours en quête de fromages ". And the New York Post's "axis of weasel" lost much of its venom when translated as a limp " axe de faux jetons " (literally, "axis of devious characters").

American wrath has been reserved for those nations which oppose their leadership, particularly following the decision to oppose shifting Nato resources to Turkey. "Three countries - France, Germany and their mini-me minion, Belgium - have moved from opposition to US policy toward Iraq into formal, and consequential obstructionism," argued the Wall Street Journal in an editorial yesterday. "If there is a war [the Turks] will face the danger of direct attack that is not feared in the chocolate shops of Brussels." The front page of the National Review blares "Putsch" with a sub-headline: "How to defeat the Franco-German power grab."

While the jibes may be puerile, the possibility that the Bush administration and commercial outlets might follow them up with punitive measures has struck some as pernicious. An ad, due to come out soon, shows three German-made cars, including an Audi and a BMW, driving towards the camera with a voice saying: "Do you really want to buy a German car?"

If there has been any European country that has attracted more contempt than others, it is France. In the Wall Street Journal, Christopher Hitchens described Jacques Chirac as "a positive monster of conceit _ the abject procurer for Saddam ... the rat that tried to roar". In the Washington Post, George Will opined that the "oily" foreign affairs minister, Dominique de Villepin, had launched France into "an exercise for which France has often refined its savoir-faire since 1870, which is to say retreat - this time into incoherence".

And in the New York Times, Thomas Friedman argued that France should be removed from the security council and be replaced with India: "India is just so much more serious than France these days. France is so caught up with its need to differentiate itself from America to feel important, it's become silly." The Wall Street Journal editor, Max Boot, argues: "France has been in decline since, oh, about 1815, and it isn't happy about it." What particularly galls the Gauls is that their rightful place in the world has been usurped by the gauche Americans."

At its ugliest, the transatlantic bile is becoming increasingly personal. When France Inter radio's correspondent in Washington, Laurence Simon, started to explain her government's position to Fox News (owned by Murdoch) she was interrupted by the presenter. "With friends like you, who needs enemies," she was told as she was taken off air.

[Miss Marple]

That is a disgusting comment. You have lost any credibility by equating the President and al Qaeda.

[Kip Lange]

No, we're talking about: Appeasement.

Sheesh. My comparison to Chamberlain is a stretch? They programmed you well. ;-)

[Burkeman1]

Hey! Cheap shot! What is yor problem with BC? Remember Flutie (prior to endorsing Hillary I mean)? What about that classic defeat of number one Nortre Dame with the Gordon field goal?

[Junior]

Yes. The author didn't do any research. He took the phrase "uttered on the Simpsons" and morphed it, like in a game of telephone.

[Burkeman1]

I am not equating them. I am just saying that Bush will be inadvertantly doing their recruitment work them. Sorry you didn;t see that was my intention.

[Burkeman1]

Whatever happened to Bush saying he wanted to get out of Kosovo? I remember him saying during the campaign that the United States should play a more humble role on the world scene? Though I would have voted for him anyway over Gore- that was one of the reasons I liked him so much.

[gridlock]

Primates capitulards et toujours en quête de fromages

Axe de faux jetons

Heh, heh.

They can't even get the insults right!

[Ron H.]

[metesky]

It could be worse: you could be a triple BC; BC High, BC and BC Law, totally lost to all rational thought and up to two quarts a day.
:O)

I remember seeing Flutie in a high school super bowl game. One of the best pure athletes I ever saw.

[Burkeman1]

Ah- I think you might be a bit resentful of BC alum influence in the New England region? Just a little? Let me guess? Holy Cross alum? Brandeis? Tufts? Or maybe a Hahhvarrd grad weeping for the lost power and glory?

[Kip Lange]

...although his brother Daryn (sp?) has always been said to be a much better overall athelete, even by Flutie himself. Met Flutie a few times. Class act. They still tell the story in my hometown of the infamous HS game where Flutie destroyed us so badly (in a nasty storm, too) that they sent all the Natick starters home on a bus at 1/2time and put in the JVs. And, of course, there's the "Flutie Tree" in Natick which all Natick HS players...er, hug, or something, can't remember...before a game.

[Kip Lange]

This UC *Berkeley* grad who grew up in NE and now lives in NE ain't afraid of BC influence, nor is he afraid of Berkeley influence, nor is he afraid of liberal indoctrination of all sorts. ;-)

[Burkeman1]

PS- Flutie played for Natick. My hometown team beat Natick after they had won two straight seasons undefeated and we had not had a winning season in years. There was a massive fight that night at the field between Wellesely and Natick kids. This was at least 5 or six years after Doug flutie had graduated- but I think Darren Flutie was on the team.

[Burkeman1]

Are you from Wellesley?

[metesky]

Darren was only a year or two behind Doug and in the super bowl game I saw (against Brockton, IIRC), Doug took the snap from center, rolled right, stopped and fired a behind the back pass the width of the field to Darren, who trotted unmolested into the end zone.

Greatest high school play I ever saw.

[Burkeman1]

Yeah- I think your right.

[Burkeman1]

PS- hate Brockton.

[Kip Lange]

Are you from Wellesley?

Maybe. ;-)

[Kip Lange]

*cough* Div I Superbowl champions in '93 *cough* *whistle* ;-)

[Kip Lange]

...broke the longest winning streak in HS history and got written up in SI for it...