How secret US, UK, Australia deal stabbed France in the back

France accused the US of stabbing it in the back after a new 'anti-China' alliance was announced between the English-speaking US, UK and Australia.

New Delhi

September 18, 2021

UPDATED: September 18, 2021 00:46 IST

US President Joe Biden in a virtual meeting with Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison (L) and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson (R). (Photo: AP)

Arelationship that goes back 250 years is under strain as France, in no uncertain terms, expressed its intense displeasure at a US action. France is miffed because the US has hurt its naval projection and diplomatic capabilities in the Indo-Pacific region, where it sees itself as an important player with long-term strategic goals.

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The last time France was this upset with the US was in 2003 when the US and the UK using the WMD (weapons of mass destruction) logic were busy invading Iraq to rid the world of Saddam Hussein, and France was not convinced of the justifications. At that time, the US retaliated by changing French fries to Freedom fries at the three cafeterias on Capitol Hill; even French toasts were not spared and received the same treatment. Renaming food apart, the bilateral relationship, for years, remained 'cool' between the two, limited to a 'working relationship' of countries who were basically on the same friendly side of ideological fractures that divide the world into camps.

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French leaders have not been known to be very subtle when it comes to expressing displeasure. In 2003, the then French President Jacques Chirac had said, "It is not well brought-up behaviour. They missed a good opportunity to shut up" berating the 13 Eastern European states that came out in support of the United States on Iraq. In 2021, events have led to the French foreign minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian, describing US promoted, Australian action as “It was a stab in the back. We had established a relationship of trust with Australia. This trust has been betrayed.”

In 2016, a defence contract had been signed according to which a fleet of submarines would be built by a French company for Australia. France called it the deal of the century, but five years on, the deal has sunk to the bottom of the diplomatic sea, and a typhoon rages on the surface. France accused the US of stabbing it in the back after a new 'anti-China' alliance was announced between the English-speaking US, UK and Australia. Known as Aukus, the alliance is the biggest defence partnership among these countries in recent times. France is upset because the new defence pact will enable Australia to build nuclear-powered submarines, for the first time, using technology provided by the US, so naturally, Canberra no longer needs to go through with the 'deal of the century' with France.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian did not mince words when he said, "This brutal, unilateral and unpredictable decision reminds me a lot of what Mr Trump used to do." He said in a radio interview, "I am angry and bitter. This isn't done between allies."

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In 2016, French Shipbuilding Company Naval Group got the contract worth 50 billion US dollars to build Australia's new submarine fleet, a deal that was confirmed when President Emmanuel Macron of France and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison shook hands on it as recently as in June 2021. But apparently, the Aukus was already well in the works, and Scott Morrison had met Joe Biden and Boris Johnson, four days before the Macron meeting, on the sidelines of the G7 summit at Carbis Bay in Cornwall, England. Interestingly, unlike other meetings, TV cameras and journalists were not allowed to film the meeting of the 3 leaders where it is now believed the final details of Aukus were agreed upon.

A joint communiqué has been issued by the French Foreign and Defence Ministers that has questioned the USA's respect for multilateralism based on the rule of law and lack of consistency which France has noticed and regretted. The New York Times reported that infuriated French officials in Washington, in protest, angrily cancelled a Washington gala to commemorate the 240th Anniversary of the Battle of the Capes, celebrating the French navy’s help in a 1781 battle during America’s fight for independence.

In fact, it was France that not only helped the US economically and militarily as it fought for independence from the UK but was the first to recognise the United States as an independent state on February 6, 1778, 3 years before the end of the American war of independence in 1781. When the French revolution overthrew the French monarchy, President Thomas Jefferson of the USA stated in 1792 that the US should “acknowledge any Government to be rightful, which is formed by the will of nation, substantially declared.”

In 1803, the United States bought the French territory of Louisiana at $ 15 million, a purchase that nearly doubled the size of the country.

In 1881, the people of France gifted the Statue of Liberty to the people of the USA to commemorate the alliance of France and the United States during the American Revolution. Since then, the 93-metre-tall, 204-tonne statue has greeted millions of immigrants arriving on the shores of the USA in New York.

Over the last 120 years, the USA and France have, shoulder to shoulder, fought wars against adversaries across continents, innumerable lives have been lost in the defence of their common ideals. But the current rift in the Indo-Pacific and the secretive nature of how France's traditional partners behaved has hurt French pride no end.

Meanwhile, China did not fail to utilise the opportunity to dig at the US, pointing out how this is but another example of American “double standards”.

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