French outrage over US submarine deal will not sink a longstanding alliance

French President Emmanuel Macron talks to U.S. President Joe Biden at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization headquarters in Brussels on June 14, 2021. BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/POOL/AFP via Getty Images

Hervé-Thomas Campangne, University of Maryland

France’s recent recall of its ambassador to the United States was an exceptional move in the long history of France-U.S. relations, which began with the 1778 treaties that created a military and commercial alliance between the two countries.

In France, President Joe Biden’s Sept. 15, 2021 announcement of a new trilateral security partnership between the U.S., Australia and Great Britain was met with disbelief and outrage.

The alliance, which enables Australia to acquire U.S. nuclear-powered submarine technology, voids a US$66 billion submarine deal Australia signed with France in 2016.

Beyond the financial implications his country will face after Australia’s change of mind, French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian accused the U.S. and its partners of “lying, duplicity, a major breach of trust and contempt.”

A Sept. 22 telephone conversation between Biden and French President Emmanuel Macron helped sketch a path toward reconciliation. The two leaders agreed on in-depth consultations on matters of strategic interest, to be followed by a meeting in Europe at the end of October. Yet Le Drian acknowledged that resolving the crisis “would take time and require actions.”

But despite French outrage over the deal, there is little chance of irreparable damage between the two countries. If anything, the current diplomatic crisis highlights a cycle of conflict and rapprochement that, as my research shows, has been characteristic of U.S.-France relations since the very beginning.

High expectations between the U.S. and a country that is often described as its “oldest ally” have often led to diplomatic misunderstandings and quarrels in the past.

‘Perfidy,’ privateers and protests

Less than 20 years after French and American soldiers fought side by side against the British on the battlefields of Brandywine and Yorktown, the two nations were at odds over the Jay Treaty of 1794, which restored economic relations between the U.S. and Great Britain.

France considered the treaty a betrayal by America. In a note that echoes minister Le Drian’s recent grievances, the governing five-member French Directorate complained that “The government of the United States has added the full measure of perfidy towards the French Republic, its most faithful ally.”

France consequently allowed its privateers to seize U.S. merchant ships, inflicting considerable injury to American commerce.

In the U.S., protests erupted in Philadelphia demanding war with France. And Congress soon passed legislation to fund a naval force, as well as the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798, which increased the residency requirement for American citizenship from five to 14 years, allowed the deportation of foreigners who were considered dangerous and restricted speech critical of the government.

The undeclared naval war that followed, later known as the “Quasi-War,” continued until the 1800 Treaty of Mortefontaine, which reestablished more friendly relations between the two countries. During the hostilities, France seized over 2,000 American ships along the Atlantic coast and in the West Indies.

US ill will

The two nations again barely avoided war during the 1852-1870 reign of Napoleon III.

In 1862, the French emperor attempted to establish a puppet regime in Mexico and installed Maximilian of Habsburg as emperor of Mexico.

For Napoleon III, this Catholic and Latin monarchy would counter the influence of the Protestant and republican U.S. in the New World.

The U.S. considered the move a violation of the Monroe Doctrine, the foreign policy established in 1823 by President James Monroe which stated that any European interference in the Western Hemisphere would be viewed as a hostile act against the U.S.

The cartoon depicts Uncle Sam as a large rooster, while other roosters, representing South American countries, walk free. European nations are represented by birds in a coop marked ‘Monroe doctrine.’ Fotosearch/Getty Images

Although the U.S. could not retaliate directly during the Civil War, fearing France would side with the Confederacy, Secretary of State William Henry Seward repeatedly warned the French that their interference in Mexico would lead to grave consequences.

By 1865, with the Civil War over, talk of a Franco-American war became widespread after President Andrew Johnson sent General John M. Schofield to Paris to warn the French that time was running out before the U.S. would resort to military intervention to expel Napoleon III’s forces from Mexico.

Although Napoleon III finally agreed to withdraw his troops, this Mexican intervention earned France much ill will in the U.S.

Its effects would be felt during the 1870 Franco-Prussian War, when despite the U.S. government’s neutral position, American public opinion clearly favored the Germans over the French.

20th-century tension

Diplomatic crises between the U.S. and France recurred throughout the 20th century.

According to U.S. diplomat George Vest, President Charles de Gaulle’s decision to withdraw France from NATO’s integrated military command in 1966 prompted former Secretary of State Dean Acheson and other foreign policy advisors to “figure every single way to throw the book back at France, put our relations to the minimum, retaliate in every punitive way we could.”

In the end, however, President Lyndon B. Johnson responded by telling de Gaulle that the U.S. was determined to join with other NATO members in preserving the deterrent system of the alliance.

In 1986, relations again soured after President François Mitterrand refused to let American bomber planes fly through French airspace on their way to strike military targets in Libya. Anti-French demonstrations followed in several U.S. cities. Crowds poured Bordeaux wine down the gutter and burned French products in bonfires.

Another crisis followed France’s refusal to support the U.S invasion of Iraq in 2003. American officials’ anger and desire to “punish France” was accompanied by a media campaign against the French “cheese-eating surrender monkeys.”

The diplomatic confrontation left very serious strains, which were not fully resolved until 2005, when bilateral relations resumed a more normal course.

In all these instances, as in today’s crisis, reactions on both sides went beyond the realm of politics: The language of passion replaced the more neutral discourse of diplomacy.

This passionate turn is the result of the mythology that surrounds France’s vision of itself as the “oldest ally” of the U.S. and of America’s idealistic vision of itself as France’s sole savior during World War I and World War II.

This mythology that whatever happens, France and the U.S. should always be on the same side – politically, economically and diplomatically – hinders more realistic relations between the two countries.

Going beyond the “oldest ally” rhetoric could allow both countries to take a more productive look at the true nature of their relations: those of two democratic nations whose interests sometimes coincide, sometimes diverge in the complex world of 21st-century international relations.

Hervé-Thomas Campangne, Professor of French Studies, University of Maryland

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Lessons from the Virginia governor’s race: Pay attention to voters’ concerns instead of making it all about national politics

Exit political stage, heading to the right. Drew Angerer/Getty Images

Mary Kate Cary, University of Virginia

I teach political speech writing. My students know that earlier this year I served on a committee that wrote the University of Virginia’s statement on free speech and free inquiry, which stated that “All views, beliefs, and perspectives deserve to be articulated and heard free from interference.”

I’m also a conservative who recently co-taught a 2020 elections class with a liberal colleague – and we both managed to survive. In my class, the mainly liberal students know they can speak freely about what’s important to them. Being open about your political views is important – but so too is listening generously to those of others.

They’ve written speeches about climate change, defunding the police, voting reforms, the Texas abortion law, misinformation on social media, electric cars, education policy, oil pipelines, critical race theory, China’s oppression of the Uyghurs, a universal basic income, and even the need for more napping during the day.

Across the board, they want to hear all sides of an argument and decide for themselves. They don’t want to be told what to believe. They’re taking speech writing because they want to learn how to make a good case in the face of a hostile audience.

And what I heard in the runup to the Nov. 2 elections was that students are increasingly worried about the job market and the economy they’ll be walking into upon graduation; they are concerned about rising crime rates in Charlottesville, where they attend college; and they wonder if they’ll be able to freely express their opinions – left or right – here at the university.

So it was no surprise to me that exit polls of Virginia voters this week showed that the economy and education were voters’ top concerns, just as they are for many of my 20-something students.

Former U.S. President Barack Obama campaigns with Democratic gubernatorial candidate amd former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe on Oct. 23, 2021, in Richmond, Virginia. Win McNamee/Getty Images

Old playbook, new circumstances

No matter what subject my students are writing speeches on – from critical race theory to electric cars – they want to take on all sides of an argument.

Similarly, many voters wanted to hear both candidates’ views on “kitchen table” issues – such as expanding job opportunities, ensuring public safety, and reforming education – in the closing weeks before the election. But that wasn’t always what voters got. Instead, they were often presented not with the issues, but with heavyweight political endorsements.

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe brought in one Democratic star after another: President Joe Biden, first lady Jill Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, former President Barack Obama, voting rights activist Stacey Abrams and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi all made appearances for the former governor.

On one hand, McAuliffe’s playbook has worked for others in the past. Research by Rob Mellen Jr. and Kathleen Searles into presidential campaign appearances during midterm elections between 1986 and 2006 showed that visits by the campaigner-in-chief can boost turnout and campaign donations for candidates – but only if the president is popular.

The problem in Virginia was that according to an NPR-PBS Newshour-Marist poll that came out the day before the election, a plurality of Democrats no longer want Joe Biden at the top of the ticket in 2024. Add to that Biden’s collapsing approval ratings, which sank lower every week in October, according to Reuters.

It seems McAuliffe didn’t realize the albatross effect Biden was having on his own candidacy. Or the disconnect right now between voters and those stars campaigning with him.

In contrast to McAuliffe, Republican candidate Glenn Youngkin talked early and often about his “day one game plan,” which focused on specific actions he’d take on the economy, public safety and education – the quality-of-life issues voters wanted to hear about. He hit the airwaves with TV ads comparing his policies with McAuliffe’s record and made his best case.

Winning candidate Glenn Youngkin made the concerns of parents a central part of his campaign. Win McNamee/Getty Images

Succession stymied

McAuliffe also faced an issue unique to Virginia that dampened his chances of success. Virginia is the only state in the nation that legally bars governors from a second successive term. Virginia law changed in 1851, after several governors – including Patrick Henry – had served two successive terms in office. So from 1851 onward, the state has had only one-term governors – with one exception, in 1974, when former Democratic governor Mills Godwin waited four years and came back as a Republican.

McAuliffe, who held the governor’s job from 2014 to 2018, was trying to be the second exception. There’s a reason former Virginia governors Chuck Robb, Mark Warner, George Allen and Tim Kaine all went on to become U.S. senators from the commonwealth instead of returning later as second-term governors. Virginians like a fresh face in the governor’s office, and this election was no exception.

The last time Virginia had a Republican governor was 2009, and a decade of one-party control of the governor’s mansion has led to a rising sense of frustration among voters – including suburban independents who swung away from Democrats this week – concerned with the stagnation of Virginia’s economy, the perceived lack of support for police and changes to parts of the educational curriculum in Virginia’s K-12 schools.

Instead of making a strong case for addressing these issues, the McAuliffe campaign preferred to bring Trump into everything. In fact, at one McAuliffe rally in late October, Joe Biden mentioned Donald Trump 24 times in a single speech.

That strategy didn’t, by and large, connect with the concerns of working-class voters – from truck drivers dealing with hikes in the gas tax to urban residents worried about the 20-year high in the murder rate to parents upset about what’s been going on in Loudoun County schools, where USA Today reports that school board meetings “have spiraled into violence, accusations of student sexual assault are dominating headlines, and some parents have sued the school board over the district’s equity initiatives.”

The turning point came when McAuliffe stunned a debate audience with his statement, “I don’t think parents should be telling schools what to teach,” not realizing that there are likely far more voters who consider themselves parents first – and members of a political party second. When he failed to disavow a Department of Justice memo labeling parents at school board meetings as “criminals,” there was no going back. His silence spoke volumes to everyone watching.

These days, it takes guts to speak up for what you believe in.

My sense is that there’s a growing number of Americans willing to stand up and courageously challenge the age in which we live. From what I’m seeing and hearing in just one college classroom, I have no doubt more brave young people – on both sides of the aisle – will make their case for positive change in the years to come.

Isn’t that what elections are all about?

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Mary Kate Cary, Adjunct Professor, Department of Politics and Senior Fellow, UVA's Miller Center, University of Virginia

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.