Another Appeaser? Conservative Hero Sarkozy To Meet With Syrian President

Back in May, President Bush traveled to Israel's Knesset to deliver a speech that equated negotiations with modern terror-sponsoring states to World War II-era appeasement of the Nazis. At first, U.S.-focused observers took the speech to be an indirect shot at Barack Obama's policy of diplomatic engagement with Iran, which seemed a reasonable enough interpretation (despite the White House's firm denial).

But one week later, an alternate explanation for Bush's address became evident when Israel acknowledged its ongoing peace negotiations with Syria (also a state terror sponsor, according to the State Department). As he must have known when he stood in the Knesset, Bush was condemning a diplomatic move that Israel's government had decided was in its own security interest.

Now another putative U.S. foreign policy ally, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, is getting into the appeasement act, at least by Bush's lights. One week after his own trip to the Knesset, in which he staked out some gutsy criticism of settlement expansion in the West Bank, Sarkozy announced on Wednesday that he will meet with Syrian President Bashar Assad when the leader visits Paris later this month.

The daylight between an American president and a French one wouldn't necessarily be noteworthy, except for the fact that many conservatives originally hailed Sarkozy's ascension as a new, "pro-American" dawn in French politics -- one not only driven by a commitment to more free-market policies, but a tough-minded approach to terrorism and international affairs.

Writing for Town Hall's website after Sarkozy's election in 2007, former senator Fred Thompson offered a toast to Sarkozy's victory. "It has been a long road, but the forces of civilization and order are beginning to understand that we are in a global struggle against the forces of death and destruction."

When Sen. John McCain visited Sarkozy in March, Time magazine's write-up was headlined "McCain's Paris Romance":

McCain spoke in such high praise of Sarkozy that it seemed as though he was on the stump for the Frenchman's re-election rather than acting on his own political ambitions. Indeed, McCain was so laudatory of Sarkozy's actions and role in improving the ties between the two nations that he predicted "our relationship with France will continue improving now no matter who becomes President of the United States." [...]

McCain...praised Sarkozy's leadership in environmental issues, pushing the harder international line against Iran's nuclear ambitions, and fighting terrorism. McCain called Sarkozy a "man of enormous energy" who has been central to bringing Franco-American relations into "an era of friendship and cooperation."

Despite the "surrender-monkey" reputation France has in America, Sarkozy's outreach to Syria is all the more notable given his predecessor's intense distaste for the regime in Damascus, given its alleged role in the assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri back in 2005. (Former French President Jacques Chirac was a close friend of the slain Hariri, and forcefully pressed the UN to set up a tribunal to try Syrian suspects.)

And while Lebanese opinion writer Michael Young is justifiably miffed at Sarkozy's apparently flagging interest in prosecuting Syria for all alleged crimes against its smaller neighbor, McCain is still offering praise for Sarkozy's judgment in countering the West's global foes. In March, the presumptive Republican nominee hailed the French president's commitment to operations against the Taliban in Afghanistan, and cited his support for a new round of UN sanctions against Iran as "very effective and ... important."

So is Sarkozy an appeaser? Given such a wide swath of attitude overlap with the Bush administration and John McCain when it comes to foreign policy, that would seem to be an unlikely argument for American conservatives to make.

Comments

[Gabrielle]

Whoah! how sad.
I have dual citizenship (french/american) and I depise my 2 presidents­.....
Do I need a new country????

[MildenHall]

Dang those French appeasers! Doing more in the way of diplomacy than Bungholelezza Rice, supposedly our foremost and most respected diplomat.

[ChiGuy]

A "conservative" French politician is left of any Democrat that has run for POTUS in decades.

[barackobama4prez]

It's gonna be hard for the GOP to attack BHO if they continue to fulfill those accusations themselves!

[LawSource]

EXACTLY!! I Agree!!

[greglemond]

FRANCE WAS RIGHT ABOUT IRAK.

THE FRENCH WENT TO VIETNAM , CHENEY AND BUSH DID NOT.

[openhand]

I love how the pattern emerges, the French were vilified for not supporting the Bush OILYgarchy's invasion of Iraq.

Now that oil is a dead end, I am hearing the line 'Nuclear Energy ... like they have in France", as a high praise, everywhere. GOP Talking Heads....s­top making sense!

[queenisabella]

of course McCain would praise Sarkozy, the French President is a right wing racist who's been pro-Bush
That said, Sarkozy will fall in line quickly behind Barack Obama after he is elected.

[resistance]

Jules-Verne à Saint-Hila­ire-du-Har­couët

[queenisabella]

clarification?
forgot all about old Jules Verne

[cimwright]

"A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banners openly against the city. But the traitor moves among those within the gates freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears no traitor; he speaks in the accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their garments, and he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation; he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of a city; he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist."

Marcus Cicero, speaking to Caesar, Crassus, Pompey and the Roman Senate

[joebiz]

Appeaser? If Sarko meets with the Syrians does that make him an appeaser? Broadly speaking, according Wikipedia: the calming, reconciling, and acquiring of peace by way of concessions or gifts (the verb 'to pay' also goes back to the Latin 'pax' = peace). Most commonly, appeasement is used for the policy of accepting the imposed conditions of an aggressor in lieu of armed resistance. Usually it means giving in to demands of an aggressor in order to avoid war.

Yes, Syria is a state sponsor of terrorism, but some have argued that Israel has "terrorize" the Palestinians living in the West Bank. When Israel met the Syrians for secret peace negotiating, were Israelis appeasing? If Israel asks Syria not to attack them should Israel attack, say Iran, then whom becomes the appeaser? Syria? Israel? or France?

The internal politics of a country tend to be an external expression of that body politic. States act in their best perceived real and imagined best interests regardless of the what term they are painted or called.

My concern is that political initiatives and actions of nation-states usually cannot be boiled down to a word or concept. The term of "hypocracy" is to a point, all but dead between states. The US claims one policy is good for one particular part of the world (I'm thinking about N.Korea vs. Cuba) but not applicable to another. Hypocracy or appeasement?

[miquelon]

Did you need to use the "surrender-monkey" slur to illustrate a point?

This base anti-French comment is Jonah Goldberg's (via Matt Groening) contribution to the political atmosphere of the "Official French Bashing" era [2003-2007].

Should it be given gravitas ? I think not.