France to send 2,000 troops to Lebanon

[sine000]

PARIS — President Jacques Chirac announced Thursday that France will send 2,000 soldiers to southern Lebanon and hopes to retain command of the U.N. peacekeeping force, as a top European Union official said international troops could start deploying within days.

The offer by France, Lebanon's former colonial ruler and key architect of a U.N. Security Council resolution to increase the force's size, was a major step toward expanding it more than a week after a cease-fire took hold.

It also represented a turnaround for Paris, which drew criticism last week after announcing it would only double its current 200-troop contingent. France's role as mission commander then came under pressure, with Italy expressing a willingness to take the lead role and pledging up to 3,000 troops.

Dominique Moisi, an analyst with France's Institute for International Relations, said France — in announcing a larger force — had felt the "international and national outrage at the contradiction between the French promises and what the French delivered.''

"At some point, the French realized they had gone too far by doing too little," he said. "It is a face-saving gesture.''

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said President Bush welcomed the decision by the French and said an international force should be "deployed urgently.''

Finnish Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja, whose country holds the rotating European Union presidency, said he wants to see the first reinforcements arrive within a week if possible.

In a televised address broadcast across Europe and the Mideast, Chirac said he made the decision after receiving guarantees allowing the force "free movement and its ability to act when faced with a possible hostile situation.''

"We obtained the necessary clarifications on the chain of command, which must be simple, coherent and reactive," Chirac said, adding that he will evaluate the size of the French contingent over the next six months as events progress. "I am convinced today that French soldiers can be deployed effectively.''

Chirac sought to claim some credit for drawing in other countries, saying that he had "spoken with several of my counterparts to persuade them to take their full part.''

France, along with the United States, helped craft the U.N. Security Council resolution that called for the expansion of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, or UNIFIL, from the current 2,000 troops to 15,000. They are to join an equal number of Lebanese troops in preserving the shaky cease-fire by making sure Hezbollah does not fire any more rockets or carry out more raids into Israel.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan will decide who leads the force, though France's current command isn't set to expire until February.

Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora said in a statement that Chirac's decision will "serve Lebanon and strengthen stability, and helps Lebanon to regain its lands through the implementation of Israeli withdrawal, and helps the state of Lebanon to spread its authority on its territories in southern Lebanon.''

Under the U.N. resolution, the Israelis are to withdraw "in tandem" with the arrival of the enhanced international force.

Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni urged the international community to act as quickly as possible to deploy the force. Sporadic violence has marked the cease-fire that took hold Aug. 14 and ended 34 days of ferocious fighting, but the truce has thus far held.

"The extremists who want to inflame the region are watching us, and this will test the strength and determination of the international community," Livni said following a meeting with Italian Foreign Minister Massimo D'Alema.

A separate controversy has developed over whether the international force will patrol the Lebanon-Syria border.

Israel insists a U.N. force take up positions along the border to cut off arms shipments to Hezbollah, while Syria says such a move would be a "hostile" act.

Saniora's Cabinet on Thursday affirmed its determination to uphold the cease-fire and called on the international community to send troops to free up the Lebanese army to patrol the country's borders. It did not directly address the issue of U.N. troops on the Syrian border.

The U.S. warned Syria to abide by a U.N. arms embargo meant to stop Hezbollah from resupplying after its monthlong war with Israel. It dismissed Syrian objections to international peacekeepers as preposterous.

"All countries must obey the arms embargo" under the U.N. Security Council resolution that set a cease-fire this month, said State Department spokesman Gonzalo Gallegos. "It is a singular duty for Syria, as the one country apart from Israel that borders Lebanon, to do so.''

France had long pressed for a clearer mandate for the beefed-up force, and led a flurry of diplomatic activity with European and other nations to help clarify the force's rules of engagement.

"Regarding the rules of engagement, they must guarantee the force's free movement and its ability to act when faced with a possible hostile situation," Chirac said.

EU foreign ministers were scheduled to meet Friday in Brussels to discuss the force. Pressure on the Europeans has grown because Israel has rejected offers of participation from Malaysia, Bangladesh and Indonesia — predominantly Muslim countries that do not recognize the Jewish state.

The United Nations was expected to hold a formal meeting Monday for countries that have expressed interest in contributing troops to Lebanon, a U.N. official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because there has been no official announcement.

The world body is hoping to nail down concrete numbers at that time so the deployment can begin quickly, the U.N. official said.

Other nations considering contributions to the force include Spain, Finland, Denmark, Germany, Greece, and Belgium. Turkey, Morocco, Nepal, New Zealand and China also are considering participating in the U.N. mission.

Article extracted from http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/Co...ageid=968332188492&col=968793972154&t=TS_Home


WHAT DO YOU GUYS THINK...AH....FRANCE SENDING 2000 TROOPS?
WHAT ROLE WILL FRANCE HAVE? WHAT ROLE WILL THE OTHER COUNTRIES HAVE?

 

[sine000]

I think France and Italy will commit the most troops...

 

[Hotshot]

Re: RE: France to send 2,000 troops to Lebanon

I think France and Italy will commit the most troops...

Thats not what you were saying before, only after you heard of the French committing to send 2000 troops did you go out on the limb, idiot.

 

[Hotshot]

Where is Blackleaf and his BS posts about the French now????

 

[cortex]

yeah where is he

and look at this--even spain---with its puny military is sending 700 troops--thats like half of their army right there

number of troops the UK is sending---ZERO

cowards

 

[Daz_Hockey]

RE: France to send 2,000

what's your problem?

you quite obviously know about as much about the UK as a man stuck in a siberian Gulag for half his life, would you stop talking utter rubbish like that.

And besides, your sat on a Canadian forum spouting crap about the UK being cowards...what the hell are you then?

Just because Blackleaf is often over-zealous with his franco-phobia, it seems to me..and a number of others, you are as bad, if not worse for your anglophobia.

Now can it!.

 

[Logic 7]

RE: France to send 2,000

Now, you peoples can say, france are coward, by accepting this, now i agree they are coward at the highest level.

 

[Daz_Hockey]

RE: France to send 2,000

I dont think the French are cowardly, not at all.

 

[Blackleaf]

Re: RE: France to send 2,000 troops to Lebanon

I think France and Italy will commit the most troops...

Rubbish. France may as well not bother sending any troops whatsoever, as they'll only surrender as soon as they arrive and they only there to "keep the peace".

Italy is sending 3000 and I think Merkel is thinking of sending 3000 German troops, even though it would be German soldiers having to face Jews again.

The cowardly French only increased their offer to 2000 after they became embarrassed that even the Italians - who also sent troops to Iraq - wanted to send 300, and that even the Belgians offered to send 700, three and a half times as many as the French first offered.

 

[Blackleaf]

Re: RE: France to send 2,000 troops to Lebanon

number of troops the UK is sending---ZERO

cowards

Britain is excused as we currently have 8000 troops in Iraq and have thousands in Afghanistan and we are leading the Afghanistan operation. Our forces are already stretched as it is. But unlike the troops going to Lebanon, we aren't "keeping the peace." We are fighting a war.

Also, Canada isn't sending any troops to Lebanon either but, unlike us, you also don't have any in Iraq.

 

[Blackleaf]

Where Rome Leads
An embarrassed France has been forced to follow in Lebanon

The Times
August 26, 2006
London

Pique, shame and ridicule often play important roles in shaping foreign policy, even in countries that aspire to principle and responsibility.

President Chirac’s announcement that France would, after all, send a further 1,600 troops to Lebanon to join the United Nations force was prompted officially by assurances of a clearer mandate (even though France helped WRITE it) and more robust rules of engagement. In fact, his offer came in reply to the widespread ridicule, within France and abroad, of his Government’s earlier proposal to send a mere 200 troops as part of the 15,000-strong international force that France, together with the United States, en- visaged in its UN ceasefire resolution.

It was not only domestic criticism that prompted a rethink, however. Italy’s offer of 3,000 troops and its suggestion that it should lead the peacekeeping force embarrassed France and underlined the American accusation that the Europeans (apart from the British) have neither the stomach nor the means to back their lofty moral positions with anything that demands commitment and cost. Indeed, Romano Prodi, the Italian Prime Minister, was quick to understand that the longer the bickering continued, the more desperate the situation in Lebanon became and precarious the ceasefire. He also saw that, in the face of French funk, Italy had a chance to show that, despite allied misgivings over his centre-left coalition and his Government’s withdrawal from Iraq, Italy remained a staunch Atlanticist and reliable Nato ally (both unlike the French).

His example has been wholly benign. M Chirac’s attempt to rescue French credibility — as well as assert French leadership of the UN force — came just in time for yesterday’s meeting of European Union foreign ministers. Kofi Annan was able to use the French and Italian commitments as inducements to smaller EU members. Belgium swiftly announced that it, too, would send troops. Spain is considering deployment, and Greece, Finland, Latvia, Sweden and Poland may follow suit. Germany, wary of any potential confrontation with Israel, is ready to deploy naval forces, and even Moscow said that it might send troops. In the interest of balance and local perception, the force should include Muslim troops. Israel would be well advised to accept offers from Indo-nesia and Malaysia, even if they have no diplomatic relations.

What exactly the troops are to do in Lebanon remains unclear. Despite M Chirac’s assertion, there is still no proper mandate, even if the rules of engagement are somewhat more robust. Israel insists that the force must disarm Hezbollah, and may make this a condition for the lifting of the air and sea blockade of Lebanon, which it says is essential to prevent arms resupplying to Hezbollah. There is, however, little realistic likelihood of any public surrender of weapons and even less of a UN pursuit of Hezbollah to disarm the fighters by force. The mandate, like so much in the Middle East, may have to be improvised on the hoof, the result of local deals and compromises. At least, however, the basis of a force is now assured and an initial fiasco avoided. Italy has made this possible.

tiemsonline.co.uk

 

[fuzzylogix]

Blackleaf- where are England's troops?

 

[Daz_Hockey]

Re: RE: France to send 2,000 troops to Lebanon

Blackleaf- where are England's troops?

Come on, you know that England's troops are part of the UK's...as are scotlands and Wales's

 

[cortex]

Re: RE: France to send 2,000 troops to Lebanon

Blackleaf- where are England's troops?

The British troops are in Iraq fighting an illegal war and failing miserably as expected.

The mission in lebanon is a legal one with a humananitarian aspect. Its objectives are fair and noble and sanctioned by the international community.

And THAT is NOT the kind of mission rogue states such as the UK are interested in.

That kind of mission should be manned by a superior peoples--superior to the british anyway--The French, The Belgians, the Italians, the Spanish, The Finns etc.

Thank you britain for sending ZERO troops to Lebanon---afterall it WAS the UKs SHAMEFULL mismanagement and COWARDLY retreat from its protectorate of PALESTINE that to a LARGE degree created the intractable
situation we have now--

or did you think we forgot that

The UK--desparately engaging ONLY in missions with the US---AFRAID to partipate --otherwise----falling shamefully behind the civilized world

I can hear that poodle yelping now..

Oh--and did I forget to say COWARDLY retreat from palestine

---no I did remember

I did remember to say COWARDLY retreat from palestine

yes--

I think the word was COWARDLY

 

[Daz_Hockey]

RE: France to send 2,000

Ever heard of William Joyce Cortex?, or Lord Hor-Hor?

was Ledbanon not a FRENCH protectorate?..besides, so Tony Blair has led the UK into an "unjust" war against Iraq, it's COWARDLY to blanket-case all of Britain as COWARDLY.

 

[fuzzylogix]

Sigh. Where are the Scots Guards when they are so desperately needed in Lebanon.

Blasting away in Basra.

 

[Blackleaf]

Re: RE: France to send 2,000 troops to Lebanon

Blackleaf- where are England's troops?

There is no such thing as an English Army.

 

[Blackleaf]

Re: RE: France to send 2,000 troops to Lebanon

Blackleaf- where are England's troops?

The British troops are in Iraq fighting an illegal war and failing miserably as expected.

The mission in lebanon is a legal one with a humananitarian aspect. Its objectives are fair and noble and sanctioned by the international community.

And THAT is NOT the kind of mission rogue states such as the UK are interested in.

That kind of mission should be manned by a superior peoples--superior to the british anyway--The French, The Belgians, the Italians, the Spanish, The Finns etc.

Thank you britain for sending ZERO troops to Lebanon---afterall it WAS the UKs SHAMEFULL mismanagement and COWARDLY retreat from its protectorate of PALESTINE that to a LARGE degree created the intractable
situation we have now--

or did you think we forgot that

The UK--desparately engaging ONLY in missions with the US---AFRAID to partipate --otherwise----falling shamefully behind the civilized world

I can hear that poodle yelping now..

Oh--and did I forget to say COWARDLY retreat from palestine

---no I did remember

I did remember to say COWARDLY retreat from palestine

yes--

I think the word was COWARDLY

Come back here when you can spell and have the correct grammar.

As for cowardly, I can just laugh at you Canadians because despite having an army of sorts you only ever use it for peacekeeping. The only time you ever go to war is when the British, your imperial masters, force you to.

 

[Blackleaf]

That kind of mission should be manned by a superior peoples--superior to the british anyway--The French, The Belgians, the Italians, the Spanish, The Finns etc.

You also have to remember that the Italians and Spanish also sent troops into Iraq, although as soon as Madrid was bombed by Al Qaeda the cowardly Spanish pulled their troops out.

The British, made of sterner stuff than the Europeans, have still got their troops in Iraq even after we were attacked by Al Qaeda.

 

[Blackleaf]

The French "grandstand" again over Lebanon.
---------------------------------


The Sunday Times
August 27, 2006



France about-turns into a bigger military mess

by Michael Portillo, former Tory Member of Parliament.



‘Il faut aller à Gorazde.” (“We must push through to Gorazde.”) The French defence minister would repeat it like a chant. It was 1995. In Srebrenica, a United Nations so-called safe haven in Bosnia, 8,000 men had been slaughtered by Bosnian Serbs.

Gorazde was another enclave that the UN had promised to defend. But the French and British forces in the region were many miles away. As participants in a UN humanitarian mission they were lightly armed. They had lorries, not tanks, and no aircraft. So the idea of pushing through to Gorazde was fanciful.

It had been a French general, Philippe Morillon, who as head of the UN forces in the former Yugoslavia had first pledged to protect Srebrenica. He did not have the resources to keep that promise and Dutch UN forces in the city did nothing to prevent the massacre. We (the other Nato defence ministers) found a word to describe the French habit of making impressive statements with no means to put them into effect. We called it “grandstanding”.

That gallic custom has been on display again over Lebanon. After the French had taken a vociferous lead in drafting the UN security council resolution that brought about the ceasefire, it was shocking to discover that France was offering just 200 soldiers towards a UN force of 15,000. Late last week, after wasting valuable time since hostilities ended nearly two weeks ago, President Chirac gave way. Having attracted the world’s scorn he raised his country’s offer to 2,000.

There is a cultural difference between the French and the British obvious in their diplomatic styles. The French believe that what they say is at least as important as what they do. They spin grandiloquent phrases and strike postures. Rhetoric is away of life and if you point out it is divorced from all strategic reality that is thought to be nitpicking.

The British, on the other hand, get engrossed in tedious detail like: “Is this practical? Who is going to supply the troops? What will be their rules of engagement?” With Lebanon the French have discovered phrase-making is not enough. In recent days they have become very practical, bleating that there are no established rules of engagement (governing what the soldiers can do and when they can fire) almost as though they were British.

If any country could have settled such important details in advance it is France. It took the kudos for working up the UN resolution. It acted as spokesman for the Arab world within the permanent five members of the council. It insisted that the resolution should not be made under chapter 7 of the UN charter, which would have given the troops the right to impose their will by force.

The unclear rules of engagement derive directly from the ambiguity of the French-inspired resolution. But France has nonetheless used the uncertainty as an excuse for delay. At any time France could have eased the problem by offering to lead the UN forces and proposing rules for all participants. Then every nation would insist on its own variations. They always do. French forces are now arriving in Lebanon with the mission and the rules still unspecified. Chirac claimed he had received assurances from the UN that enabled him to increase French numbers.

In reality he buckled because the Italians had offered to lead the deployment and the Americans had mischievously welcomed that bizarre idea. France could not bear the mortification of operating under the command of its southern neighbour — least of all in Lebanon, a country so strongly tied to the French by history and culture. Chirac’s sheer ineptness has brought him avoidable humiliation. Already held in contempt by America and disdained by the British, he has now advertised his unreliability to a wider global audience.

At the heart of this mess is France’s reluctance to tackle Hezbollah. Back in 2004 the security council adopted resolution 1559 demanding that the terrorist organisation be disarmed. Like many resolutions it is a declaration without serious intent. In the two years since it was adopted nothing has been done, at least not until the recent Israeli military campaign, and that was denounced by most countries, including France. During recent days, as France has procrastinated, arms have been pouring in from Syria and Iran to re-equip the terror group. France’s failures of both diplomacy and NERVE have made it less likely that the ceasefire will hold, and made the UN mission more dangerous.

There is now no suggestion that UN troops will attempt to disarm Hezbollah in accordance with UN policy. The question must be rather, to what extent will the French-led mission turn a blind eye to the group’s re-armament? If Hezbollah moves its Katyusha rockets back to the Israeli border, will the blue-helmeted Frenchmen stand in their way? It is extraordinary how little France has gained after 46 years of doggedly pitting itself against the United States. Perhaps President Charles de Gaulle was still reeling from the shame of the second world war (when France had had to be rescued from Nazism by America and Britain) when he expelled the American-dominated Nato from Paris in 1960. The North Atlantic alliance hurriedly relocated itself in a hospital building in Brussels that had just been finished but not yet occupied by the Belgian health service. It is housed there still, and visitors often remark on the wide corridors, not realising they were designed for trolleys.

Since 1960 successive presidents have chafed against American influence in Europe and the world. They begrudged Europe’s reliance on US forces stationed in Germany to defend us from the Soviet threat. But France (in common with other European countries except Britain) was unwilling to transfer money from social to military spending to reduce that dependency. The sense of being in America’s debt has powerfully increased French resentment of Washington.

France’s performance in Bosnia actually did something to restore its prestige. Despite the rhetorical hyperbole, once Nato had taken over from the UN, French troops performed effectively. For a short while US impatience with Europe (over its inability to handle crises on its own territory) was reduced.

But that relative success seemed only to encourage France to move apart from America. In the years after the Gulf war of 1991 it gradually peeled away from the alliance that enforced the no-fly zones protecting Iraqi Kurds from air attack. Chirac had enjoyed a special relationship with Saddam and with the Arab world in general. He sought to establish a European foreign policy that was unAmerican and more pro-Arab. The French also worked to make the EU into a military alliance that could be used for peacekeeping without American support. As usual, the purple prose ran far ahead of what European forces could actually do unassisted.

Now that British and American forces are bogged down in Iraq, this should be the moment for the French cock to crow. But what exactly has the distinctive French alternative produced for the world or France? The softer European approach to Iran over its nuclear programme was decisively rebuffed, and Europe has had to join America in calling for sanctions. When France was invited to provide leadership over Lebanon, it vacillated. Its offer of 2,000 soldiers remains underwhelming. Chirac’s pro-Arab policies have not even bought off Muslim discontent at home, as the urban riots showed.

Last week a former junior member of the Bush administration, Jeff Babbin, likened undertaking a military operation without the French to going on a deer shoot without an accordion — you just leave behind the noisy useless baggage. For France to have split so decisively with the globe’s most powerful nation without having established a successful alternative approach to the resolution of crises is a major policy failure for Chirac. Whatever criticisms he may have of George W Bush, the American does not fail to put his troops where his mouth is.

That is where Chirac has been caught out. In the case of Lebanon, grandstanding was not enough. He has now stepped forward to do his duty with all the relish of a man slipping into a quicksand. French forces may be ineffective, or suffer casualties, or both. Washington cannot wait to see what happens next.


thetimesonline.co.ujk