# France looking for "big role" in rebuilding Iraq **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 25, 2003, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/france-looking-for-big-role-in-rebuilding-iraq/164146 "2003-03-25T22:36:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Desmostylus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c57346/32.png) [@Desmostylus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Desmostylus)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2003, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/france-looking-for-big-role-in-rebuilding-iraq/164146/41 "2003-03-26T11:48:55Z")
Gack. Missing lines: So who is Gilles Munier? Is there really a “French-Iraq Association for Economic Cooperation”? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2003, 11:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/france-looking-for-big-role-in-rebuilding-iraq/164146/42 "2003-03-26T11:54:57Z")
Fuck 'em. Let them rebuild Vietnam, first. ---
**Author:** ![Fox\_in\_the\_Snow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/82dd89/32.png) [@Fox\_in\_the\_Snow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fox_in_the_Snow)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2003, 12:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/france-looking-for-big-role-in-rebuilding-iraq/164146/43 "2003-03-26T12:25:02Z")
_Originally posted by Brutus_ > [@](#): > > The neo-Vichy regime in Paris is punishment enough for the French. You really are quite the ignoramus aren’t you? Disagree with the French position all you want but Neo Vichy? Please! Either your understanding of French history is inexusably pathetic or you’re tossing about emtionally loaded hyperbole in the hope of getting a reaction. Either way you make a most compelling case for your own cannonization as St.Fuckwit, patron of cretins and dullards. ---
**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2003, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/france-looking-for-big-role-in-rebuilding-iraq/164146/44 "2003-03-26T12:29:19Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by manhattan \* > There are ~40 nations which saw the need to overthrow Saddam’s regime. I’m sure there’s more than enough diplomatic firepower among them to help the Iraqis build a new great nation. By the way I dearly hope this is sarcasm. ---
**Author:** ![Futile\_Gesture](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f05b48/32.png) [@Futile\_Gesture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Futile_Gesture)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2003, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/france-looking-for-big-role-in-rebuilding-iraq/164146/45 "2003-03-26T13:07:51Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by yosemitebabe \* > \*\*I think if they voiced concerns much later, after things have settled down (however and whenever that may happen) then it wouldn’t be _quite_ so tacky. \*\* What, and you think no other countries are lining up their plans for a piece of the action? Everyone’s already in line with their dinner plates at the ready, jostling for position. The French would be mad to delay, waiting until the war is over would be too late. Anyway, you don’t get to start a war claiming to be selfless heroes of liberty and democracy, and then demand first pick of the spoils at the end. It may not seem fair, but that’s what being selfless heroes is all about. You pull this trick too often and even people with very limited memories may begin to doubt your real motives. Unfortunately we’ve already reached this point. The US will engineer things so that they receive the lion’s share. All aid given will not be charity, but carefully calculated investment in expectation of profitable returns. A selected few other countries will be tossed the left overs in payment for their support and France will get squat except knowing that their suspicions were proved correct. You all talk like the US has a moral right to tell the Iraqi’s who should rebuild their country. Is this a war of liberation, like Bush would love us to believe, or occupation? ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2003, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/france-looking-for-big-role-in-rebuilding-iraq/164146/46 "2003-03-26T14:04:49Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by manhattan \* > \*\*As regards direct French (or German or Russian or whoever) government participation in helping to form a new Iraqi government or participating in diplomacy? Screw 'em. There are ~40 nations which saw the need to overthrow Saddam’s regime. I’m sure there’s more than enough diplomatic firepower among them to help the Iraqis build a new great nation. \*\* Shouldn’t it be up to the newly freed Irakis to decide? Or are they supposed to be freed only to the extent that they will have to submit to US decisions? Beside, Chirac stance is perfectly consistent. If you’re opposed to the invasion of a country, then necessarily, you must oppose to the invading powers’ will to administer said country. You might believe that the US is right in waging this war, but try to see tings from the other side : imagine, say, that Mexico decide, without reason to do so, to invade Guatemala and then state that it will administer the country after the take over (and grant various rebuilding contracts _paid with Guatemala money_ to Mexican corporation). If the US opposed the invasion of Guatemala, shouldn’t it oppose too the administration of Guatemala by the Mexicans after the war? ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2003, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/france-looking-for-big-role-in-rebuilding-iraq/164146/47 "2003-03-26T14:26:58Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Desmostylus \* > \*\*Gack. > > Missing lines: > > So who is Gilles Munier? Is there really a “French-Iraq Association for Economic Cooperation”? \*\* I don’t know about the “french-Irak Association for economic cooperation”, but Gilles Munier is the secretary general of an association called “amities franco-irakiennes” (“franco-Iraki frienships”). [Here’s](http://amiraq.free.fr/old_version/main.html) their website (in french). Apparently, there were some important personalities amongst the founding members of this association (ambassadors, parliament members, writers, etc…), including a former french minister of defense who resigned when France decided to participate in the first Gulf War. So, this association isn’t a club of weirdos and possibly has some actual political influence. ---
**Author:** ![Tee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@Tee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tee)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2003, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/france-looking-for-big-role-in-rebuilding-iraq/164146/48 "2003-03-26T15:02:13Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Collounsbury \* > \*\*Cutting out the UN and opposing countries because of petty resentments over France’s correct analysis that this war is a crock will do only one thing: render charges in the Islamic world that the Americans are the new crusaders / colonialists all the more vividely true. Things are already at a very dangerous boil, the worst I have seen it in a whole decade, the very worst. > \*\* LOL. Unfortunately a correlative exists here in the US…we already know lots of Arabs would like to kill us, and will die trying. The Islamic world beamed into our living rooms at night consists of people chanting “Death to America, Death to Israel” and burning flags and whatnot. You know. We _got_ that. Thanks. But I agree with you about not letting current disagreements spill over into blocking a UN-Iraqi team effort at reconstruction. I too am interested in avoiding the appearance of colonialism. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2003, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/france-looking-for-big-role-in-rebuilding-iraq/164146/49 "2003-03-27T04:55:51Z")
Heck, if you let the French take _any_ part, their revisionist history textbooks will eventually record their crucial role in the democratization of Iraq. Right after the chapter on how the entire country was in _La Résistance_. ---
**Author:** ![NaSultainne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/8797f3/32.png) [@NaSultainne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NaSultainne)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2003, 9:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/france-looking-for-big-role-in-rebuilding-iraq/164146/50 "2003-03-27T09:02:36Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Collounsbury \* > At present this war is a bloody disaster for the American image in the world and especially the Islamic world. \<\<_snip_\>\> > Cutting out the UN and opposing countries because of petty resentments over France’s correct analysis that this war is a crock will do only one thing: render charges in the Islamic world that the Americans are the new crusaders / colonialists all the more vividely true. **Things are already at a very dangerous boil, the worst I have seen it in a whole decade, the very worst.** _bolding mine_ I fully concur with **Collounsbury**. I feel an almost surreal sense of disconnect from the news reporting this war, both here and abroad. It seems we’re getting the rah-rah sports version, complete with the latest models (load up on options!) and uniforms while overseas they’re hearing dead civilians, dead Brits, bombing, bombing, bombing, starving Iraqi’s and more of the same. I am quite alarmed at the progressively violent nature of the so-called peace protests around the world, the anti-American bias of the media in many parts of the world, and the future implications of both. This is a war in primetime, and war can never be anything but ugly. We do not come off looking like the good guys when bodies are splashed on network news. I’m afraid we’re going to win the Iraq battle and lose the bigger war. ---
**Author:** ![istara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e79b87/32.png) [@istara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/istara)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2003, 10:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/france-looking-for-big-role-in-rebuilding-iraq/164146/51 "2003-03-27T10:23:51Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by NaSultainne \* > \*\*I’m afraid we’re going to win the Iraq battle and lose the bigger war. \*\* Ditto. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/france-looking-for-big-role-in-rebuilding-iraq/164146.md?page=2)