Two’s a Company

Jacques Chirac might be wearing a hearing piece, as L'Express revealed a few days ago, but during the meeting with Tony Blair yesterday it was the British prime minister who didn't do the listening. On the central point in question, military cooperation in Europe (ie the European army), Blair didn't budge. While he supports the idea of strengthened military cooperation, he stressed after the meeting with Chirac, it must be "fully consistent with Nato alliance".

Chirac can't have been surprised. The French president, one-half of an axis rather tritely referred to as the engine of European integration, has had a tough time with his British counterpart. He gets on much better with the engine's other half: Germany's Gerhard Schröder. At the 40th anniversary of the Elysée treaty, the entire German parliament flew to Paris for a joint session with the French parliament at Versailles and when Schröder had to rush back to Berlin, he let Chirac represent Germany at the European Council in Brussels. How does that compare with an autographed picture of Leo Blair?

What Blair had to say about an European army must have seemed to Franco-Germany like more of the same old dithering on Europe. At the tripartite meeting in Berlin Blair said yes to more military cooperation, only to have his spokesman recant. As a member of the foreign office put it frankly last week in Berlin: Britain is backing two horses at the same time, Nato and the European army. No wonder then, the favourite English proverb in Paris and Berlin these days begins with "two's a company". The core Europe, as the French and the Germans see themselves, are fed up with waiting for a Tony Blair who wants to have it both ways. The Brussels meeting this summer, inept as it was orchestrated, was supposed to be a snub to Britain. Chirac's visit to London wasn't.

And yet. While no one will manage to get the entire House of Commons to jump on the Eurostar next year for the centennial entente cordiale celebrations, the visit of the Queen will nevertheless mend bridges even further. Celebrating D-Day together will help, too. If this year was one for Franco-German relations, next year might look entirely different. And there is one aspect in particular that should have the Germans worry about French loyalty. In the press conference on Monday, both Blair and Chirac stressed their commitment to Africa. Both Britain and France have strategic interests there; Germany doesn't. And missions to Africa, as Blair seemed to suggest, would be "fully consistent with Nato alliance".

That Germany took part in the French-led peace mission to Congo was meant as a return payment for Chirac's backing of the German anti-war stance. But those dues have been paid. Germany has no interest in joining a cleaning crew for post-colonial refuse, however grand its name. And that could change the European geometry. Today, a Franco-British axis might appear still as unlikely as a joint military headquarters in the Brussels suburb of Tervuren. But the meeting between Blair and Chirac showed that they have at least one thing in common. They know what to do with an European army in the first place.