Surprise: France Now Seen As Unreliable Ally

Even Brits, much closer to European thought than American, have seen what Chirac never thought they would see. The French can't be relied upon.

55 per cent of Britons regard France as the UK's least reliable ally, while 73 per cent view the US as the country's most reliable.

Is this news? Only to younger Brits. It would be interesting to see what eastern Europe thinks of the French these days. I imagine the numbers weren't great there before France's failed Iraq gambit.

Tony Blair had this to add regarding Chirac's vision of an EU to oppose the US. Spelling out the damage that would be inflicted by Mr Chirac's vision of a "multipolar" world, he said: "I am not really interested in talk about punishing countries, but I think there is an issue that we have to resolve here between America and Europe and within Europe about Europe's attitude towards the transatlantic alliance.

"I don't want Europe setting itself up in opposition to America . . . I think it will be dangerous and destabilising."
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