French Appeasement

So quick to feed the alligator.

From Hot Air:

Just ahead of the big Iranapolooza at the UN, France announced that it no longer supports sanctions against the Islamic Republic and that there is in fact now a split on the Security Council on the question of whether Iran has to freeze its enrichment programs as a precondition to entering talks. This abrogates France’s previous support for sanctions, and gives the Russians and Chinese an out on sanctions both clearly were reluctant to support. Like its backdoor support for Iraq in the run-up to that war, France’s move combined with its veto power on the UNSC all but guarantees that either a) Iran gets nuclear weapons, or b) there will be a nasty war to make sure that Iran doesn’t get nuclear weapons.

Could this be related to the French Commander's decision to NOT disarm Hezbollah?
Perhaps:

Yet the Iranians now have France by the short hairs, because French troops are within shooting distance of Nasrallahs goons, and it’s clear to everyone that Nasrallah’s goons will fire if told to do so. This gives Iran an important wedge on the UNSC. That probably wasn’t the outcome the Iranians hoped to achieve when Hezbollah kidnapped Israeli troops and started launching those Khaibar missiles. But for the Iranians, it’s not a bad outcome. Not bad at all. (Hot Air)

In this Reuters story, French President Chirac throws a red herring of a statement:

"I do not believe in solutions that do not involve dialogue, in any case a dialogue taken to its limits. I am never in favour of sanctions. I have never observed that sanctions were very effective."

This move, among others, simply reflects for the most part, French opposition to American superpower. It's no secret France is buddying up with China, and shows ambivalence toward the U.S.

This is Foreign Policy 101, power politics. The French aren't boldly asserting their power, simply because they would be laughed out of the international community. They are however, instrumentally undermining the uni-polar world favoring the United States, while comforting up to a growing China and securing their image in the ever-increasing Islamic world.