What is Macron talking about? This will make democracies stronger.

25 August 2021

NATO and Australia (click here) have been engaged in dialogue and cooperation since 2005. Australia is one of a range of countries beyond the Euro-Atlantic area, often referred to as “partners across the globe”.

In a joint political declaration in June 2012, NATO and Australia signalled their commitment to strengthening cooperation.2013, work continues to advance the relationship through an Individual Partnership and Cooperation Programme. This agreement was renewed in 2019....

Australia has been a really good friend to the USA. It has acted as an extension of NATO for a least a decade. Australia was in Afghanistan when the war was still taking casualties and Australians died there. I guess the EU wasn't represented and it has Macron angry as one of the five legal nuclear nations.

Maybe Macron is worried that other democracies will have USA technology without France benefitting from it. Why can't there be French partners observing and assisting if necessary in all the plans for updating Australia's navy?

September 16, 2021
By Roger Cohen and Michael D. Shear

Furious over President Biden’s announcement (click here) of a deal to help Australia deploy nuclear-powered submarines, French officials in Washington on Thursday angrily canceled a gala at their Washington embassy to protest what they called a rash and sudden policy decision that resembled those of former President Donald J. Trump.

The event commemorating the “240th Anniversary of the Battle of the Capes,” which was to have taken place Friday evening at the French embassy and aboard a French frigate in Baltimore, will not happen, according to the official. France’s top naval officer, who had traveled to Washington for the event celebrating their navy’s help with America’s battle for independence in 1781, will return to Paris early instead.

The gala’s cancellation was an immediate reflection of the rage felt among French officials and diplomats in the wake of the submarine deal, which Mr. Biden announced at the White House on Wednesday with the leaders of Australia and Britain joining virtually....