March 27, 2003
The French
LONDON (AFP) - The United Nations must oversee the reconstruction of Iraq, French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin said, staking out a position against Washington's views on rebuilding the country.
"The UN must steer the process. More importantly, the UN must be at the heart of the reconstruction and administration of Iraq," De Villepin said in a speech to a London think tank.
"The legitimacy of our action depends on it," he told the prestigious International Insitute of Strategic Studies (IISS).
What's with the French anyway? The more that I read, the more I believe that their "principled" stand was just a charade. Now they're smelling billions of Euros to be made after the war is over, and they want a piece of it.
I liked Ann Coulter's comments the other day in her column: "Most auspiciously, the Arab League has appealed to the United Nations Security Council to stop the war. One can only hope the Security Council will agree to intervene. How would they stop us? Would France threaten us with war? Young men across America would have to enlist as a matter of honor. The Army could use as its recruiting slogan: "Are you afraid to fight the French?" Even liberals would enlist as a way to pick up glorious service with no risk of injury."
A lot of fence mending will need to be done between "Old Europe" and the United States after the hostilities have concluded. I wonder who will make the first step?
