Between France and the United States, friendship remains stormy
“Macron welcomes Biden to Paris to celebrate a relationship that is not always easy”, title this June 8 The New York Times. Ties between the two countries go back “to France’s decisive support for American independence against the British”, recalls the newspaper. “Tumultuous, often tense”, they nevertheless resist the tests.
“President Biden’s five-day stay in France, an exceptionally long visit for an American president, especially in an election year, speaks volumes about this friendship. But it also illustrates its ambiguity. French gratitude for the American sacrifice is in tension with the Gaullist rebellion in the face of any sign of enslavement.”
Ardent defender of “strategic autonomy” European, Emmanuel Macron continues this Gaullist tradition. For his part, Joe Biden “believes passionately in the US-led world order” and had little appreciation of the French reluctance in the face of the invasion of Iraqin 2003.
Toasts and tensions
This ambiguity will form “the backdrop of a sumptuous state dinner at the Élysée on Saturday, offered by Macron in return for his welcome to the White House in December 2022, the first state visit under the Biden administration”, continues the New York newspaper.
“The toasts and cordial atmosphere will not completely mask the tensions between Washington and Paris – on the war in Gazaon the best way to support Ukraine and on
