Jonathan

>>How exactly is France intending to "deter" Iraq? By selling them parts for their planes and helicopters, and making deals with them for cheap oil? With no threat of military action if they don't comply with unanimous UN resolutions?

Containment may have been UN policy, but I agree it has not worked. Syria and Jordan have cheerfully supported illegal oil and other trade to flourish since the Gulf war. This trade has been so large and lucrative that oil from the "oil for food" deal seems to have been siphoned off into the illegal trade, an extraordinary revelation that makes a mockery of sanctions. China and India helpfully supplied fibreoptics and parts for missiles. The list goes on. Yes, France and Russia are in there big time. Yes, France has oil contracts on which it cannot currently work because of sanctions, but which are worth billions. Of course they are afraid a new regime might overturn these contracts.

Does that make them wrong? Is it a reason to berate/hate a nation that once gifted the US the Statue of Liberty and which was referred to by your President as "our great ally" just a year ago? Let us not pretend we allowed containment to fail only in the last year, and let us not pretend that France or anybody else has a duty/obligation to drop contracts worth billions just because that would be convenient for us. People need to get real.

It is unfortunate that natural allies are lashing out at each other, threatening to damage each other's economies or "never to forget" some slight. France seems to be targeted because it openly opposes. People seem uncomfortable about criticising Germany's pacificism, for obvious reasons. Nobody says boo to China.

Regards

JR