On one hand I understand them, sudden cancelation of a contract is very unpleasant and demeaning.
On the other hand, this is basically a diplomatic version of a tantrum; and powerful countries rarely respond to a tantrum by doing anything substantial.
If France could get the rest of the EU behind it, then maybe. But rest of the EU looks at the problem with disinterest, given that they stood to gain nothing from the original contract.
It's not just a contract though. France actually has a maritime border with Australia and its own interests in the Pacific -> the entire French Pacific strategy was wiped out by 3 "allies" behind its back.
There are basically three things that France can now do:
a) abandon New Caledonia entirely. This may happen anyway, as an independence referendum is scheduled for December and the balance is uncertain;
b) join AUKUS as a junior partner, very painful but logical;
c) embrace China out of spite or as a result of different geopolitical calculus. That would probably have significant realignment echos in Europe, because France has a big voice in the EU. I am a little afraid of this scenario, though I consider it unlikely to happen.
Edit: I remembered that Tahiti is at stake too. Not certain about local independence movement status.
The EU and (especially France and Germany) is not THAT critical of China as the US (and other countries...), and France has a big sense of national pride and no problems acting on it.
Is this in any way "good"? I don't know, but realisticaly i CAN see the EU siding more with China than the US in the long run.
Well, the big thing holding up a trade deal with China right now is that China decided to sanction several MEPs and the
European Parliament's human rights subcommittee for scrutinizing their forced labour camps in Xinjiang, which the European Parliament of course considered an attack on democracy itself. So if France used its sway to get the EU to align with China, that'd basically demonstrate that the French government's feelings had more power than the pretence of EU democracy.
Now... i would think it would go on the line of "change through rapprochement", and even this would not be THAT far fetched. China may be a dictatorial regime, but its an dictatorial regime that values good trade deals and making money. So getting concessions on not genociding the Uigurs (at least not in a way the world can be witness) are becoming more easy.
> b) join AUKUS as a junior partner, very painful but logical;
Why is this logical? These partners have already shown that they are going to betray France's trust and lie to them. It would be better to be on your own than have unreliable partners, or worse ones that work against you.
To be fair, France has consistently betrayed its allies, throughout history. The start of WWII is worth looking at, where both France and Britain broke mutual defense treaty after mutual defense treaty appeasing Germany.
Culture runs deep. France adores Vercingetorix, who surrendered to Julius Caesar after "releasing" all the women and children to die of starvation between the Roman and French lines at the Battle Of Alesia.
Since WWII, France has been a fickle ally to the US at best.
Unreliable partners are Europe's mode of operation since Antiquity. The positive side is that European countries mostly know what to expect from one another. Xi's China is a new player whose intents are much less legible.
> These partners have already shown that they are going to betray France's trust and lie to them.
What? Betray France? So France jeopardizes a nation's national defense by failing to deliver critical defense assets, and this is spun into being a betrayal on France?
Are we supposed to put our blinders on to think that this issue is about France's commercial interests and not Australia's national security?
They hit their September deadline with the project, and all of the requested changes. The assets were on track, with the requested changes.
The betrayal issue comes with the very recent statements from Australia about supporting the project, whilst behind the scenes unbeknownst to France planning to scrap it.
There's a new trending joke in defense circles about how the opportunity was missed for a FAUKUS alliance, which would have been comically delicious to pronounce.
There are also alternative ways of sending a message, e.g. targeting of US soft power. While INSTEX was not a huge success in its time, an alternative payment mechanism that works around US sanctions aligns well with French (and even EU) interests and strongly against US.
It's more that Caledonia could chose to leave. But that only marginaly change the issue. France has other territories in the Pacific.
> b) join AUKUS as a junior partner, very painful but logical;
That would be very illogical. France interests are not aligned with the USA. Also they are a nuclear country with a permanent seat on the UN security council. They will never be a junior partner to an alliance with the USA or Australia let alone the UK.
> c) embrace China out of spite or as a result of different geopolitical calculus. That would probably have significant realignment echos in Europe
There is no need for spite or realignment. China is a diplomatic and commercial partner of the EU. The systemic opposition is strictly the doctrine of the USA. There is plenty to gain through the diplomatic route as long as you see China as an equal partner and not an inferior country. Lobbying China is harder than it used to be but not impossible.
There are plenty of alternative to these three scenarios anyway. The logical next steps would just be pushing for further for military integration in the EU (Afghanistan already left a sour taste in everyone's mouth anyway) and lobby to get the EU - Australia free trade agreement severely limited then carry on as usual. The relationship with the UK will see no progress as long as Johnson is PM so it seems useless to waste time on it.
> lobby to get the EU - Australia free trade agreement severely limited then carry on as usual
This type of response always baffles me. Australia here is not buying what France is selling. If they object to that, making it harder for Australians to buy other things France is selling is the opposite of clever.
And in reverse - Australia sells food and raw materials. Under what circumstances is it bad for France to trade bits of paper for actually useful physical goods?
Restricting trade is cutting of the nose to spite the face. Australia sells commodities, we don't care if any individual block trades with us. China tried clamping down on trade with Australia and it didn't achieve much. They've got to buy from someone else, that someone else's customers becomes Australia's customers.
In France, fierce protectionism is part of the governmental policy longer than the Republic exists. This has seeped into EU policies as well, though not to the same extent.
> Australia here is not buying what France is selling. If they object to that, making it harder for Australians to buy other things France is selling is the opposite of clever.
Australia have been extremely untransparent regarding their position and how they conducted the whole negociation. They lied to their French counterparts during the summer and announced their withdrawal in an extermely clumsy and frankly disrespectful way. Why would you want to put in place treaties easing controls and trades with countries which have already proven they are dishonest?
> Restricting trade is cutting of the nose to spite the face.
No one talked about restrictions. I just expect France to lobby for things to stay as they are rather than go in the direction of easier trading.
What plausible risk is there that Australians won't honour the deals they make under a free trade deal? If someone buys a million dollars worth of Australian beans they're going to get tonnes of beans.
I don't fault the French if they don't see a benefit and want to be annoying in some sort of tit-for-tat strategy; but making trade harder is not going to make their lives better. People only trade when the trade improves their position.
A $60+ billion military deal is never going to be handled under a free trade agreement. I haven't read into the details but I doubt there was even any fraud involved; just standard political backstabbing. The French weren't given an opportunity but they are not worse off.
> There is plenty to gain through the diplomatic route as long as you see China as an equal partner and not an inferior country.
Does China see other countries as equal partners? Their Howling Wolf diplomacy seems to kick in whenever anything they dislike appears in any media. See their current hatefest against Lithuania, a country with population smaller than Shanghai.
I for one am not very ready to sacrifice, e.g. freedom to criticize the Chinese system or to say that Taiwan is Taiwan and not Chinese Taipei or whatever. And I do not trust China commercially either, given their history of copying everything and then flooding markets with cheap knock-offs to undermine the original producers.
We have a load of our own problems here in the West, but we can at least discuss them mostly freely and the authoritarian developments (governmental and distributed alike) tend to get some pushback and dissent, and the dissidents do not end up in jail or shot. These are not the values of Xi's China and any partnership with it will end in Beijing dictating their demands.
> See their current hatefest against Lithuania, a country with population smaller than Shanghai.
The US isn't much better. They have a history of invading of destabilising the governments of countries they don't like.
> we can at least discuss them mostly freely and the authoritarian developments (governmental and distributed alike) tend to get some pushback and dissent, and the dissidents do not end up in jail or shot.
Tell that to all the countries who tried to implement communist systems of government... and found their leaders shot or in jail.
> I do not trust China commercially either, given their history of copying everything and then flooding markets with cheap knock-offs to undermine the original producers.
And I don't trust the US commercially, with their history of enforcing tariff-free markets on countries and flooding them with cheap US-made goods that wipe out domestic production leaving the countries in very dire straits (see e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rice_production_in_Haiti).
This is where different countries have different experiences.
If I were a Latin American, I would be distrustful towards American power projection. But I am a Central European and our history with the U.S. is a lot better.
I am not trusting them blindly, but the worst import we had from the U.S. so far was a shallow-ish pop culture, plus some of the racial nonsense that really rubs the wrong way in a different context.
As a citizen of the UK, I'd argue that Reagan-style economics (which caused us to privatise a lot of our industry and public services in a such a way that it was effectively just a huge cash giveaway to private companies) and ridiculous copyright terms are our worst imports. You may be less effected by those kind of things in Central Europe though, and you could certainly argue, and you could certainly argue that these were our own stupidity rather than being enforced upon us.
> The US isn't much better. They have a history of invading of destabilising the governments of countries they don't like.
This is whataboutism and has nothing to do with discussion on France/EU's stance of China.
Reading on you comments, are you living in the past? We are discussing current politics.
> Tell that to all the countries who tried to implement communist systems of government... and found their leaders shot or in jail.
That was happening 40 years ago in current EU countries, whats your point?!
> with their history of enforcing tariff-free markets on countries and flooding them with cheap US-made goods that wipe out domestic production leaving the countries in very dire straits
Again derailing conversation from China to USA
Edit: go ahead and keep downvoting me for literally pointing out logical fallacies
US largely outsourced its manufacturing, so EU is not as dependant on US as other way around - EU to USA import export graph [0]
Treating EU like a tiny country that needs to rely on imports of finished products is discounting the fact EU is the largest trading block in the world.
Besides EU can decide to incentivise the manufacturing of key goods (like germany getting into electronics manufacture).
Also US cannot bully EU like it does other weaker countries.
> Does China see other countries as equal partners? Their Howling Wolf diplomacy seems to kick in whenever anything they dislike appears in any media.
China is an authoritarian country with a strategic vision which put it at odd with its closest neighbors. It's in no way an easy partner. Then again, neither is it an unreadable one nor a completely unreasonable one. What China wants is pretty clear: control of the South China sea and being the dominant soft power of the region. With this framework in mind, a lot can be achieved through negociations.
I am not saying countries should always be soft with China. Their track record record regarding human rights is worrying. I am very much in favor of using tit for tat measures regarding their distortion of competitive markets and their threats on the Chinese diaspora in Europe and the USA have to stop.
Still I am not convinced that a policy of systematic opposition and war mongering will do much good. Xi Jinping is already 68. His rule won't last eternally. It seems better to me to adopt a position of observation, containment and soft power influence than direct confrontation. I understand that Taiwan might be a victim of it which sadden me a bit but is something I am fine with from a realpolitik point of view. I consider this position better for Europe than following the USA in its opposition which I view as essentially motivated by a desire to protect the position they consider to be theirs in the international order rather than some kind of moral imperative.
"Xi Jinping is already 68. His rule won't last eternally."
Eternally not, but the recent progresses in longevity field might give him 20-30 more years at the helm.
This is an interesting strategic question that isn't discussed as much as it ought to. Even Western nations are evolving into gerontocracies. We should probably introduce some hard term limits. Already there are U.S. Senators that served more than 40 years.
d) stand its ground independently, invest in its military to have the capability it needs, work with AUKUS if and when it is in its interests to do so. This includes taking a more 'non-aligned' stance on China, but that'd not be historically new (France was the first Western country to recognise the PRC and De Gaulle even advised Kennedy to do it sooner than later).
French vital interests are in Africa, not in Pacific. And the strategic situation in Sahel isn't good. Given that military budgets are always strained, it makes sense to concentrate on the core challenges and leaving the Pacific be.
France has strategic interests in Africa. And it has also vital interests in the Pacific because it actually has territories in the region.
France has the largest maritime EEZ in the world, owning 8% of the global EEZ areas. A lot of that is due to its territories in the Pacific and Indian Ocean. New Caledonia also has 25% of the world's nickel reserve. Defending your national territory is a vital interest.
Saying that it "should leave the Pacific be" is exactly what the US and Australia want (hence France being excluded from AUKUS), and exactly what it should not do.
You got me. I was only thinking about the territories themselves (arguably not crucially important) and forgot about the maritime EEZs that come with them. These seem to be rather important.
(Though probably not "vital" in the same sense as suppression of jihadism is. A massive growth of jihadism in North Africa could destabilize peace in France itself, while loss of Pacific territories would only be painful economically.)
Offering closer partnership to India, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore might be a viable alternate way forward for France - and they might find it in their interest too. More "indo" than "pacific" though.
They've already been working on this with India [1]. They have been working on building partnerships in the region for years, with a focus on India and Australia.
This is why they are deeply pissed off beyond the loss of this submarines deal. Basically the US have 'torpedoed' a big part of their long term strategy here.
India is naturally more inclined to cooperate with the UK, though. Colonial legacies are complicated and Indian elite tends to go study in English-speaking countries, so there is a lot of personal contact. It is much rarer to meet Indian students in continental EU.
Lets not pretend this was a mighty backstabbing by everyone else who france treated with nothing but kindness. I can't speak much for the US or Aus, but I wouldn't call them on good terms with the UK, beyond even the historical jibes.
I'm sure this is bad for France, don't get me wrong, but in terms of how their allies acted, its not particularly shocking or even abnormal.
It is, tho. Diplomacy is a sensible thing. It's not as much about the contract lost, but the way it was handled.
The contract was also a key piece for a deeper collaboration in the pacific area, one of the most important geopolitical sectors for the next 20 years.
France shared highly confidential material for months, while Australia already had decided to breach the contract. In international relationships among allies where trust is crucial, it's pretty big.
As I said, France has not been a strong ally of the UK (again, cant speak for US or Aus, but may be a similar situation there) in the past or even very recently, why you would expect differently the other way around I don't know.
Also doesn't look like this was a "breach" of contract, just a cancellation. A breach implies what was done is illegal in international law, a cancellation implies they simply went elsewhere.
Early in the cold war there were a few senior generals on both sides that thought the US could or should make a first strike against Russia. But the leadership and the populous on both sides of the curtain never thought that was what it was all about at all. The aggressor was always going to be Russia invading western Europe, and NATO was always about defending it.
There have been a long history of "hot" confrontations and proxy wars like Korea, Cuba and Angola, Vietnam, the Russians in Afghanistan and then the US in Afghanistan etc.
But go ask random people on streets in the US, Russia or Europe, and they will focus on the "cold war" and the iron curtain and NATO's defense of the west against the threat of Soviet expansion.
If you ask about NATO _today_, I'd wager people would see it as a fancy name for "alliance with the US", which includes but is not limited to defense against Russia. A lot of people would think about Afghanistan, for instance.
Yes but only the Afghanistan invasion was a NATO operation, the rest were either US only or US and allied countries, but not NATO.
The NATO treaty only protects members if they were attacked in Europe or the North Atlantic. If bin Laden had hit the Sear Tower instead of the WTC it would probably not have been a NATO operation.
I don't understand why major arm contracts suddenly went from having obvious geopolitical implications (e.g. Turkey S-400 procurement) to being "mere contracts".
It's not hard to understand why Turkey's case has critical geopolitical implications while Australia's doesn't really have one. I mean, just take a look at the sellers and the military alliances the buyers are in.
Australia went from an ever-closer relationship with France to ditching them, unannounced. Even if it is unwarranted, surely France reaction _is_ a major geopolitical consequence.
> Australia went from an ever-closer relationship with France to ditching them, unannounced.
This is a very disingenuous take on the issue, if not outright completely wrong, and it feels like you intentionally decided to feign ignorance regarding France's failures to deliver and even meet the contract's basic requirements.
Despite those difficulties (that do not sound ludicrous considering the complexity and the amount of technology transfer that was required, but I'm no submarines expert), as I mentioned in another comment, the joint communique between French and Australian Defence minister from August mentioned that "both sides [were] committed to deepen defence industry cooperation and enhance their capability edge in the region" and that "ministers underlined the importance of the Future Submarine program".
Looking back, it is hard to argue that official line was not very disingenuous, even after acknowledging the issues with the program.
People with big egos often throw tantrums, US and other presidents are no exceptions. And you need a big ego and some other nasty personality traits to navigate super-competitive realm of high politics and end up with some powerful role.
Iran treatment after islamic revolution and temporary imprisonement of diplomats and CIA officials can be described as bruised ego / tantrum from outsiders perspective. There were great relations before and could have been good relations after if US was willing to put a blind eye on that (like it does with neighboring Saudi Arabia and all that is happening there).
>>On one hand I understand them, sudden cancelation of a contract is very unpleasant and demeaning.
It was definitely not sudden. They had been warned many times for growing costs, delays etc.. It may have been 'sudden' in the sense that they didnt think Australia would actually pull through with the threat.
Sudden in the sense that in spring they discussed concretely what's going wrong and what is needed to fix it, and came out thinking everything is OK for Australia. While Australia was negotiating with the US and UK.
If growing costs and delays are the supposed issue, buying nuclear submarines of an unspecified design while having no nuclear facilities or know-how, with the scheduled date of arrival of the first nuclear sub is in 2040, is a very weird way of fixing it.
If Australia wanted a quick and cheap submarine class, they should have bought the Japanese proposal. If they wanted a nuclear one, they could have tendered for it and gotten a French proposal based on the Barracudas. But they did neither.
>Sudden in the sense that in spring they discussed concretely what's going wrong and what is needed to fix it, and came out thinking everything is OK for Australia. While Australia was negotiating with the US and UK.
I saw no evidence of that. There was only reports of worsening relations.
>If growing costs and delays are the supposed issue, buying nuclear submarines of an unspecified design while having no nuclear facilities or know-how, with the scheduled date of arrival of the first nuclear sub is in 2040, is a very weird way of fixing it.
No nuclear facilities or know-how is a a problem that can now be finally fixed. 2040 gives us plenty of time, and really, its only 10 years later than what was expected.
>If Australia wanted a quick and cheap submarine class, they should have bought the Japanese proposal. If they wanted a nuclear one, they could have tendered for it and gotten a French proposal based on the Barracudas. But they did neither.
Yeah but come on. Comparing the french nuclear subs versus the US ones is apples an oranges. Only the US have the tech for sealed engines, and no need to refuel.
French and Australian Defence ministers met in August and issued a joint communique [1] mentioning that they discussed "enhancing and diversifying France’s military co-operation with Australia" and stating that "both sides committed to deepen defence industry cooperation and enhance their capability edge in the region" and most specifically that "ministers underlined the importance of the Future Submarine program".
Announcing 2 weeks later that the contract was cancelled sounds like a "sudden" announcement to me, while the press reports that discussions had been ongoing for almost 18 months in secret make that communique slightly deceitful from Australian government imo.
On the original contract in 2016, Germany also bid and in all likelihood could have won, since Germany has far more experience with building non-nuclear subs with Diesel or fuel-cell drives. France had to start the designs almost from scratch since they offered a redesign of their nuclear subs. France desperately wanted the contract and probably only won the bidding by intentionally bidding too low and too quick, downplaying their technical challenges. This behavior of France has bitten various European supposed allies and supposed good neighbors a number of times. Either they got outbid by a phony French bid. Or they were customers of such a bidding process, getting endless delays and price overruns.
So I'd be surprised if there were any substantial EU backing for France in this matter.
The press coverage you linked contradicts you. It says that TKMS' bid is too risky because it requires doubling the size of their existing design, which is risky.
Furthermore, it's entirely on Australia to choose the best bid. If they thought TKMS' bid is risky to upscale, they should also have thought DCNS/Naval Group's bid is also risky due to having to redesign and chosen the Japanese design which was the closest to what they wanted. Considering the fiasco that was their precious submarine acquisition, it's not surprising it failed again.
I don't know what they're going to do while waiting for the new subs to come in the 2050s, the Collins-class isn't supposed to last that long.
> Why bother having a defence meeting with the UK if they’ll turn around tomorrow and spit in France’s face again by not telling them something?
It is not the UK's responsibility to inform France of a status change in their contract with Australia. In fact the UK has a duty to stay out of it as they are not parties to the contract- it is up to Australia to inform France.
France has a right to be peeved, but not at the UK or US.
I do not think anyone is arguing that the UK has some kind of legal obligation to inform France. Alas, alliance and more broadly international politics go beyond minutiae of contracts.
It didn't have any obligation - legal, moral or otherwise. In fact it had an obligation not to interfere or surprise Australia by communicating things. The responsibility was 100% on Australia.
France was probably aware much earlier that the contract was in jeopardy. Everyone in France being on vacation in July and August didn’t help at the end.
Doubling the price, delays, and changing the terms (reducing local contribution told from 90 to less than 60) aren’t good ways to secure a deal with a partner that was already angry in 2018.
They were aware there were issues, and negotiations happened on how to fix them, with the French leaving them with the impression everything is good. Meanwhile Australia was already negotiating an alternative deal.
> They were aware there were issues, and negotiations happened on how to fix them, with the French leaving them with the impression everything is good.
The French culture is to never deliver bad news before the deadline has arrived. Underlings will never tell their boss that something is impossible, decisions will be made by grande-ecole-bosses without technical expertise and relationships are valued far higher than knowledge and expertise. You'll always get the first impression that all is well and they'll manage before the deadline. If you need a real non-sugar-coated insight as to how the project is going you need to gather your own data. Discreetly.
However, as soon as shit has hit the fan and bosses got involved, they'll bend over backwards to make things work. But you cannot expect meeting the first deadline, ever. Same for the first budget. Subsequent ones depend on the size of the project.
> The French culture is to never deliver bad news before the deadline has arrived.
No, it definitely is not. You have no idea of how this kind of project works.
Naval Group has a ton of experience managing large contracts with state actors. They have worked with Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Singapore, Taiwan, Pakistan, India, Malaysia, Egypt and I am probably forgetting some. They know what they are doing.
Screw them, they're one of the guilty parties responsible for the ongoing continental-size abuse of population in the EU, through various EU and ECB policies.
They can sell the subs to the ECB, that should be easy. The ECB pays them, and parks the subs in Frankfurt (or Hamburg, whatever). Similar to the way they hand out cash for worthless FPIIGS government bonds.
> One article said that the France contract was about 7 bil per diesel sub, while the new one will be 4 bil per nuclear sub
Both of those are wrong.
> Is it possible that France though that Aus had no alternative and ran the price up?
No, there was an official procedure with multiple candidates ( France, Japan and a third one I can't recall). Australia chose the French option, even though it required significant modifications to a nuclear design to make it diesel electric.
> I can't imagine how you can justify 7 bil for a diesel sub
Furthermore, the contract included significant know-how transfers and construction in Australia, so whatever the price per sub turned out to be, it wouldn't be for the subs alone.
As for why the 4 bil per sub is wrong - they haven't decided anything. They don't know the design, upon what it will be based ( the smaller UK Astute class or the bigger US Virginias), etc. Lots of infrastructure needs to be built, and people have to be trained since Australia has no nuclear sector to speak of. So any price projection as of today is purely theoretical.
Oh and the first subs under the new contract should be available in 2040, so probably a decade later. That's a long time.
Much more likely that the standard optimism that runs through people when they are starting new projects lead them to dramatically underestimate the difficulty of the project - which ended up being "design a new sub from scratch" instead of the intention, which was "lightly modify an existing design"
That’s kind of irrelevant to the situation though. It’s not Australia changing suppliers that’s the problem but how they did it. France found out they got dropped from the news if I’m right.
afaik, the cost comes from the original requirement from Australia that wanted the adaptation of existing nuclear designs into diesel ones. France was one of the few willing to tackle the work, and also why this 180° change towards nuclear-powered subs is a bit weird.
This is the real question. From the outsider perspective, it looks like the navies and militaries of the western world are evolving towards extremely expensive, specialized high-tech "toys", produced in very low numbers, that require extensive year-long training just to get anything done. Most of which are useless against guerilla warfare insurgencies, and of doubtful utility against peer nation state competitors. Feels more like a job program than efficient armed forces.
As a deterrent against nation states, it's questionable how a billion dollar submarine would handle a swarm of thousands of suicidal drones, at a fraction of the cost of the submarine. The submarine takes years to build, a no-name Chinese factory can pump out thousands of drones in a day.
Imho, the approach of the PLA, betting more on unmanned drones backed by China's industrial capacity, is a more logical evolution of warfare.
The main purpose of the submarine is to deliver nuclear missiles from near the enemy shore, so arguably it's most important feature would be to remain undetected.
It's unclear if modern tech can "reveal" where the subs are, rendering them useless.
I agree on your point regarding surface ships, they are walking dead, they can't defend against drone/missile swarming.
Seems like manufactured outrage from France for the benefit of its electorate. The UK and US are entirely innocent. They have no standing in the Australia-France contract, and the burden of informing France of the cancellation clause being invoked falls entirely on Australia - if they failed to do so and France feels peeved, they should take that up with Australia. The UK and US are entirely irrelevant.
Even by the "do unto others as you would have them do unto you" standard of morality - France would do exactly the same as the UK and US have if the shoe was on the other foot.
I do wonder to what extent if any France being instrumental in interdicting vaccines bound for Australia in March had on this outcome. I recall that around the same time the UK exported vaccines to Australia (see [1] ). Given it was Australia that approached the UK to initiate this deal towards the end of march, it may not have been the smartest move by France to demonstrate that they are not reliable and are perfectly willing to shaft Australia when the chips are down.
But of course we don't know if there was any relation at all between those events, the timings are suspicious tho.
So they have failed to deliver for five years with huge cost overruns and delays and get all mad when their customer says enough is enough. I wonder if any lessons learned will make it way back to their defense industry, or if playing the victim will suffice for them too.
So Australia’s answer is to further delay things by starting over and getting nuclear submarines at best 10 years later than the new french timeline, but realistically probably a lot more?
The USA rarely sells "new" stuff so allies get the product after all that shit has happened. France was overhauling a sub design for them (probably why it was years late and way over budget).
> So they have failed to deliver for five years with huge cost overruns and delays and get all mad when their customer says enough is enough.
The contract was signed in 2019 after a complicated negociation and is only in the design phase.
If you go read the Australian reports on it, you will see that the main cause of delay is actually Australia. Contrary to France which has experience working on this kind of deal - they sold submarines to Brasil and India and boats to many more countries - Australia is not used to do this kind of work and it shows. The Morrison government however is all too happy to pin the blame on France especially considering the deal was mostly done by Turnbull.
If you expect the American contract to go smoothly and with no overrun, you are in for quite a surprise I fear.
* next year a new presidential election will take place in France
* Macron may use this contract cancellation as an opportunity to decrease France participation in NATO (technically it could leave the integrated command) as De Gaulle did before him.
This would allow him to capture more votes from the right as he would appears as a strong leader then, acting in continuity with General de Gaulle...
France can not go out of NATO, the alliance with all its drawbacks is just too important for its own defense.
This contract cancellation may end up being in the best interest of both Australia and France:
* Australia changed its mind in the course of the last years regarding what types of submarines it really needs.
* Such change of perspective affected the partnership in between both countries, which could have escalated into a costly commercial dispute where Australia would have acted in bad faith to prevent the French delivering what they did not want anymore.
There are tension in the Asia-Pacific regions in between the US and China, and France like other Europeans countries are too far from home to take a part in this.
> France can not go out of NATO, the alliance with all its drawbacks is just too important for its own defense.
France could. It has maintained a strategy of independence regarding its own defense. France has its own nukes, its own nuclear submarines, designs and operates its own fighters, has a nuclear powered aircraft carrier and has some limited capacity of projection. France has no American troops stationed on its soild and apart from the catapults of the carrier, none of their technologies come from the USA.
France has one of the lowest public opinion on NATO in the EU. I think France would be very much in favor of sidelining NATO for a EU force. The issue is the others members of the EU particularly in the east.
> France like other Europeans countries are too far from home to take a part in this.
France has mutiple territories in the Pacitic including New Caledonia which has a border with Australia.
France, like any other western country, UK included, is heavily dependent on the USA for defence. France’s low opinion of NATO is part of a broader delusional weltanschauung which sees France as an economic and military superpower. It is staged in a parallel universe where the 19th century never ended and the Franco-Prussian war never happened.
> France, like any other western country, UK included, is heavily dependent on the USA for defence. France’s low opinion of NATO is part of a broader delusional weltanschauung which sees France as an economic and military superpower.
No, it definitely is not. France defense is entierely built around its hability to launch a nuclear strike. Officialy the doctrine hasn't changed much since the fifties. France maintains the mean to destroy an unspecified number (it was estimated to be at least ten in the fifties) of cities in any country of the world which makes invading France strategically unsound in terms of cost.
France is not the UK. It has little illusion regarding its overall projection power or economic importance. No one in France thinks France is a superpower. That doesn't mean the French view themselves as impotent or insignificant. France remains a modern economy and a regional power which is quite proud of its culture and heritage and thinks it can influence its neighbors and allies for the best in an union which is large enough to stand on its own and defend its own values in an increasingly multipolars world.
From a French point of view, the EU shouldn't have to align itself with the USA or China to exist safely. If that means making concessions to Germany and the northern countries when it comes to how the economy should work and accepting long negociations in Brussels to reach agreements then so be it. That's the price of being an union and it's better than the alternative.
There's a strong story here under the surface that we're not privy to. A few observations that may or may not be connected, but in macro politics, isn't everything always connected?:
First, please read this gripping tale of the evolving national defense strategies of the United States and France within the "Indo Pacific" as seen during the change in foreign policy beginning with the later Obama years and the Trump administration: https://carnegieendowment.org/2020/10/21/france-other-indo-p...
One of the tl;drs of the link above is that France sees the Indo Pacific MUCH differently from many other western powers including the USA and UK. They see themselves having a prominent authority in the Indo Pacific, key to their economic interests. To this end, they have been trying to establish an alliance of powers in the region including Australia and India.
France actually pulled off a coup earlier this decade when they closed on a major Military Air Craft sale to India with their Dassault Rafale. They have been similarly trying to establish long term military relationships with Australia and thus align the two countries' interests.
The interests that France has in the region are about safeguarding their own economic concerns and not necessarily directly address the rise of the communist party of China.
This is in stark contrast to the UK, the US and Australia who see the rise of the communist partys ambitions directly threaten their countries defense and economic concerns.
There is going to be a lot of drama after this because what just happened here is a domino fell. We're seeing the emergence of an alliance that could form part of the "Quad" in the region or something similar that may not necessarily have France as the central power directing diplomacy in the region.
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[ 5.2 ms ] story [ 176 ms ] threadOn the other hand, this is basically a diplomatic version of a tantrum; and powerful countries rarely respond to a tantrum by doing anything substantial.
If France could get the rest of the EU behind it, then maybe. But rest of the EU looks at the problem with disinterest, given that they stood to gain nothing from the original contract.
a) abandon New Caledonia entirely. This may happen anyway, as an independence referendum is scheduled for December and the balance is uncertain;
b) join AUKUS as a junior partner, very painful but logical;
c) embrace China out of spite or as a result of different geopolitical calculus. That would probably have significant realignment echos in Europe, because France has a big voice in the EU. I am a little afraid of this scenario, though I consider it unlikely to happen.
Edit: I remembered that Tahiti is at stake too. Not certain about local independence movement status.
The EU and (especially France and Germany) is not THAT critical of China as the US (and other countries...), and France has a big sense of national pride and no problems acting on it.
Is this in any way "good"? I don't know, but realisticaly i CAN see the EU siding more with China than the US in the long run.
It should be noted that this was in retaliation to the EU imposing sanctions on a number of Chinese officials.
wouldn't this encourage future human-rights violations as "leverage" for concessions?
Why is this logical? These partners have already shown that they are going to betray France's trust and lie to them. It would be better to be on your own than have unreliable partners, or worse ones that work against you.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoney_War
A lost sale in contrast? That seems more like normal business than lying and betrayal.
I would not expect France to the same behavior with other EU members.
Culture runs deep. France adores Vercingetorix, who surrendered to Julius Caesar after "releasing" all the women and children to die of starvation between the Roman and French lines at the Battle Of Alesia.
Since WWII, France has been a fickle ally to the US at best.
What? Betray France? So France jeopardizes a nation's national defense by failing to deliver critical defense assets, and this is spun into being a betrayal on France?
Are we supposed to put our blinders on to think that this issue is about France's commercial interests and not Australia's national security?
The betrayal issue comes with the very recent statements from Australia about supporting the project, whilst behind the scenes unbeknownst to France planning to scrap it.
It's more that Caledonia could chose to leave. But that only marginaly change the issue. France has other territories in the Pacific.
> b) join AUKUS as a junior partner, very painful but logical;
That would be very illogical. France interests are not aligned with the USA. Also they are a nuclear country with a permanent seat on the UN security council. They will never be a junior partner to an alliance with the USA or Australia let alone the UK.
> c) embrace China out of spite or as a result of different geopolitical calculus. That would probably have significant realignment echos in Europe
There is no need for spite or realignment. China is a diplomatic and commercial partner of the EU. The systemic opposition is strictly the doctrine of the USA. There is plenty to gain through the diplomatic route as long as you see China as an equal partner and not an inferior country. Lobbying China is harder than it used to be but not impossible.
There are plenty of alternative to these three scenarios anyway. The logical next steps would just be pushing for further for military integration in the EU (Afghanistan already left a sour taste in everyone's mouth anyway) and lobby to get the EU - Australia free trade agreement severely limited then carry on as usual. The relationship with the UK will see no progress as long as Johnson is PM so it seems useless to waste time on it.
This type of response always baffles me. Australia here is not buying what France is selling. If they object to that, making it harder for Australians to buy other things France is selling is the opposite of clever.
And in reverse - Australia sells food and raw materials. Under what circumstances is it bad for France to trade bits of paper for actually useful physical goods?
Restricting trade is cutting of the nose to spite the face. Australia sells commodities, we don't care if any individual block trades with us. China tried clamping down on trade with Australia and it didn't achieve much. They've got to buy from someone else, that someone else's customers becomes Australia's customers.
Australia have been extremely untransparent regarding their position and how they conducted the whole negociation. They lied to their French counterparts during the summer and announced their withdrawal in an extermely clumsy and frankly disrespectful way. Why would you want to put in place treaties easing controls and trades with countries which have already proven they are dishonest?
> Restricting trade is cutting of the nose to spite the face.
No one talked about restrictions. I just expect France to lobby for things to stay as they are rather than go in the direction of easier trading.
I don't fault the French if they don't see a benefit and want to be annoying in some sort of tit-for-tat strategy; but making trade harder is not going to make their lives better. People only trade when the trade improves their position.
A $60+ billion military deal is never going to be handled under a free trade agreement. I haven't read into the details but I doubt there was even any fraud involved; just standard political backstabbing. The French weren't given an opportunity but they are not worse off.
Does China see other countries as equal partners? Their Howling Wolf diplomacy seems to kick in whenever anything they dislike appears in any media. See their current hatefest against Lithuania, a country with population smaller than Shanghai.
I for one am not very ready to sacrifice, e.g. freedom to criticize the Chinese system or to say that Taiwan is Taiwan and not Chinese Taipei or whatever. And I do not trust China commercially either, given their history of copying everything and then flooding markets with cheap knock-offs to undermine the original producers.
We have a load of our own problems here in the West, but we can at least discuss them mostly freely and the authoritarian developments (governmental and distributed alike) tend to get some pushback and dissent, and the dissidents do not end up in jail or shot. These are not the values of Xi's China and any partnership with it will end in Beijing dictating their demands.
The US isn't much better. They have a history of invading of destabilising the governments of countries they don't like.
> we can at least discuss them mostly freely and the authoritarian developments (governmental and distributed alike) tend to get some pushback and dissent, and the dissidents do not end up in jail or shot.
Tell that to all the countries who tried to implement communist systems of government... and found their leaders shot or in jail.
> I do not trust China commercially either, given their history of copying everything and then flooding markets with cheap knock-offs to undermine the original producers.
And I don't trust the US commercially, with their history of enforcing tariff-free markets on countries and flooding them with cheap US-made goods that wipe out domestic production leaving the countries in very dire straits (see e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rice_production_in_Haiti).
If I were a Latin American, I would be distrustful towards American power projection. But I am a Central European and our history with the U.S. is a lot better.
I am not trusting them blindly, but the worst import we had from the U.S. so far was a shallow-ish pop culture, plus some of the racial nonsense that really rubs the wrong way in a different context.
This is whataboutism and has nothing to do with discussion on France/EU's stance of China.
Reading on you comments, are you living in the past? We are discussing current politics.
> Tell that to all the countries who tried to implement communist systems of government... and found their leaders shot or in jail.
That was happening 40 years ago in current EU countries, whats your point?!
> with their history of enforcing tariff-free markets on countries and flooding them with cheap US-made goods that wipe out domestic production leaving the countries in very dire straits
Again derailing conversation from China to USA
Edit: go ahead and keep downvoting me for literally pointing out logical fallacies
Treating EU like a tiny country that needs to rely on imports of finished products is discounting the fact EU is the largest trading block in the world.
Besides EU can decide to incentivise the manufacturing of key goods (like germany getting into electronics manufacture).
Also US cannot bully EU like it does other weaker countries.
https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php...
China is an authoritarian country with a strategic vision which put it at odd with its closest neighbors. It's in no way an easy partner. Then again, neither is it an unreadable one nor a completely unreasonable one. What China wants is pretty clear: control of the South China sea and being the dominant soft power of the region. With this framework in mind, a lot can be achieved through negociations.
I am not saying countries should always be soft with China. Their track record record regarding human rights is worrying. I am very much in favor of using tit for tat measures regarding their distortion of competitive markets and their threats on the Chinese diaspora in Europe and the USA have to stop.
Still I am not convinced that a policy of systematic opposition and war mongering will do much good. Xi Jinping is already 68. His rule won't last eternally. It seems better to me to adopt a position of observation, containment and soft power influence than direct confrontation. I understand that Taiwan might be a victim of it which sadden me a bit but is something I am fine with from a realpolitik point of view. I consider this position better for Europe than following the USA in its opposition which I view as essentially motivated by a desire to protect the position they consider to be theirs in the international order rather than some kind of moral imperative.
Eternally not, but the recent progresses in longevity field might give him 20-30 more years at the helm.
This is an interesting strategic question that isn't discussed as much as it ought to. Even Western nations are evolving into gerontocracies. We should probably introduce some hard term limits. Already there are U.S. Senators that served more than 40 years.
France has the largest maritime EEZ in the world, owning 8% of the global EEZ areas. A lot of that is due to its territories in the Pacific and Indian Ocean. New Caledonia also has 25% of the world's nickel reserve. Defending your national territory is a vital interest.
Saying that it "should leave the Pacific be" is exactly what the US and Australia want (hence France being excluded from AUKUS), and exactly what it should not do.
(Though probably not "vital" in the same sense as suppression of jihadism is. A massive growth of jihadism in North Africa could destabilize peace in France itself, while loss of Pacific territories would only be painful economically.)
No-one is going to help you preserve your own territory, quite the opposite. National territory is always a vital interest.
This is why they are deeply pissed off beyond the loss of this submarines deal. Basically the US have 'torpedoed' a big part of their long term strategy here.
[1] https://thediplomat.com/2020/03/whats-behind-the-rising-indi...
FAUKUS does have a ring to it…
The French strategy can’t possible be based on selling submarines to a continent country bordering its atolls
The French government has openly stated that this goes beyond the canceled contract per se.
This is about the not getting a heads up for the negotiation with US/UK
France knew Australia was unhappy with the deal
Multilateralism was a pillar of that strategy. Australia shifting from an equal partner to a US vassal signals an end to that.
If buying American makes one a vassal wouldn’t buying French be the same ?
I'm sure this is bad for France, don't get me wrong, but in terms of how their allies acted, its not particularly shocking or even abnormal.
Also doesn't look like this was a "breach" of contract, just a cancellation. A breach implies what was done is illegal in international law, a cancellation implies they simply went elsewhere.
Early in the cold war there were a few senior generals on both sides that thought the US could or should make a first strike against Russia. But the leadership and the populous on both sides of the curtain never thought that was what it was all about at all. The aggressor was always going to be Russia invading western Europe, and NATO was always about defending it.
But go ask random people on streets in the US, Russia or Europe, and they will focus on the "cold war" and the iron curtain and NATO's defense of the west against the threat of Soviet expansion.
The NATO treaty only protects members if they were attacked in Europe or the North Atlantic. If bin Laden had hit the Sear Tower instead of the WTC it would probably not have been a NATO operation.
This is a very disingenuous take on the issue, if not outright completely wrong, and it feels like you intentionally decided to feign ignorance regarding France's failures to deliver and even meet the contract's basic requirements.
https://www.politico.eu/article/why-australia-wanted-out-of-...
Looking back, it is hard to argue that official line was not very disingenuous, even after acknowledging the issues with the program.
I doubt the EU could even contemplate creating something similar:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Countering_America%27s_Adversa...
Iran treatment after islamic revolution and temporary imprisonement of diplomats and CIA officials can be described as bruised ego / tantrum from outsiders perspective. There were great relations before and could have been good relations after if US was willing to put a blind eye on that (like it does with neighboring Saudi Arabia and all that is happening there).
It was definitely not sudden. They had been warned many times for growing costs, delays etc.. It may have been 'sudden' in the sense that they didnt think Australia would actually pull through with the threat.
If growing costs and delays are the supposed issue, buying nuclear submarines of an unspecified design while having no nuclear facilities or know-how, with the scheduled date of arrival of the first nuclear sub is in 2040, is a very weird way of fixing it.
If Australia wanted a quick and cheap submarine class, they should have bought the Japanese proposal. If they wanted a nuclear one, they could have tendered for it and gotten a French proposal based on the Barracudas. But they did neither.
I saw no evidence of that. There was only reports of worsening relations.
>If growing costs and delays are the supposed issue, buying nuclear submarines of an unspecified design while having no nuclear facilities or know-how, with the scheduled date of arrival of the first nuclear sub is in 2040, is a very weird way of fixing it.
No nuclear facilities or know-how is a a problem that can now be finally fixed. 2040 gives us plenty of time, and really, its only 10 years later than what was expected.
>If Australia wanted a quick and cheap submarine class, they should have bought the Japanese proposal. If they wanted a nuclear one, they could have tendered for it and gotten a French proposal based on the Barracudas. But they did neither.
Yeah but come on. Comparing the french nuclear subs versus the US ones is apples an oranges. Only the US have the tech for sealed engines, and no need to refuel.
Announcing 2 weeks later that the contract was cancelled sounds like a "sudden" announcement to me, while the press reports that discussions had been ongoing for almost 18 months in secret make that communique slightly deceitful from Australian government imo.
[1]: https://www.foreignminister.gov.au/minister/marise-payne/med...
On the original contract in 2016, Germany also bid and in all likelihood could have won, since Germany has far more experience with building non-nuclear subs with Diesel or fuel-cell drives. France had to start the designs almost from scratch since they offered a redesign of their nuclear subs. France desperately wanted the contract and probably only won the bidding by intentionally bidding too low and too quick, downplaying their technical challenges. This behavior of France has bitten various European supposed allies and supposed good neighbors a number of times. Either they got outbid by a phony French bid. Or they were customers of such a bidding process, getting endless delays and price overruns.
So I'd be surprised if there were any substantial EU backing for France in this matter.
Some of the press coverage back then and now: https://thediplomat.com/2016/01/has-germany-lost-the-bid-to-... https://www.reuters.com/article/us-australia-submarines-comp...
Furthermore, it's entirely on Australia to choose the best bid. If they thought TKMS' bid is risky to upscale, they should also have thought DCNS/Naval Group's bid is also risky due to having to redesign and chosen the Japanese design which was the closest to what they wanted. Considering the fiasco that was their precious submarine acquisition, it's not surprising it failed again.
I don't know what they're going to do while waiting for the new subs to come in the 2050s, the Collins-class isn't supposed to last that long.
https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-australia-trade-deal-runs...
AUKUS basically blindsided France, didn’t give them any warning or a chance to diplomatically save face. It was like spitting in their face.
Why bother having a defence meeting with the UK if they’ll turn around tomorrow and spit in France’s face again by not telling them something?
It is not the UK's responsibility to inform France of a status change in their contract with Australia. In fact the UK has a duty to stay out of it as they are not parties to the contract- it is up to Australia to inform France.
France has a right to be peeved, but not at the UK or US.
They were still very willing to continue to continue on the diplomatic & cooperation fronts.
It was the French who blew up that aspect because of the submarine contract. It doesn't seem right to point the finger at the Australians for that.
https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/call-to-review-submarin... (Jan) mentions walking away.
Doubling the price, delays, and changing the terms (reducing local contribution told from 90 to less than 60) aren’t good ways to secure a deal with a partner that was already angry in 2018.
The French culture is to never deliver bad news before the deadline has arrived. Underlings will never tell their boss that something is impossible, decisions will be made by grande-ecole-bosses without technical expertise and relationships are valued far higher than knowledge and expertise. You'll always get the first impression that all is well and they'll manage before the deadline. If you need a real non-sugar-coated insight as to how the project is going you need to gather your own data. Discreetly.
However, as soon as shit has hit the fan and bosses got involved, they'll bend over backwards to make things work. But you cannot expect meeting the first deadline, ever. Same for the first budget. Subsequent ones depend on the size of the project.
No, it definitely is not. You have no idea of how this kind of project works.
Naval Group has a ton of experience managing large contracts with state actors. They have worked with Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Singapore, Taiwan, Pakistan, India, Malaysia, Egypt and I am probably forgetting some. They know what they are doing.
They can sell the subs to the ECB, that should be easy. The ECB pays them, and parks the subs in Frankfurt (or Hamburg, whatever). Similar to the way they hand out cash for worthless FPIIGS government bonds.
I can't imagine how you can justify 7 bil for a diesel sub.
Is it possible that France though that Aus had no alternative and ran the price up?
Both of those are wrong.
> Is it possible that France though that Aus had no alternative and ran the price up?
No, there was an official procedure with multiple candidates ( France, Japan and a third one I can't recall). Australia chose the French option, even though it required significant modifications to a nuclear design to make it diesel electric.
> I can't imagine how you can justify 7 bil for a diesel sub
Furthermore, the contract included significant know-how transfers and construction in Australia, so whatever the price per sub turned out to be, it wouldn't be for the subs alone.
As for why the 4 bil per sub is wrong - they haven't decided anything. They don't know the design, upon what it will be based ( the smaller UK Astute class or the bigger US Virginias), etc. Lots of infrastructure needs to be built, and people have to be trained since Australia has no nuclear sector to speak of. So any price projection as of today is purely theoretical.
Oh and the first subs under the new contract should be available in 2040, so probably a decade later. That's a long time.
As a deterrent against nation states, it's questionable how a billion dollar submarine would handle a swarm of thousands of suicidal drones, at a fraction of the cost of the submarine. The submarine takes years to build, a no-name Chinese factory can pump out thousands of drones in a day.
Imho, the approach of the PLA, betting more on unmanned drones backed by China's industrial capacity, is a more logical evolution of warfare.
Some links: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/37062/china-conducts-t...
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/13284/americas-gaping-...
It's unclear if modern tech can "reveal" where the subs are, rendering them useless.
I agree on your point regarding surface ships, they are walking dead, they can't defend against drone/missile swarming.
Even by the "do unto others as you would have them do unto you" standard of morality - France would do exactly the same as the UK and US have if the shoe was on the other foot.
I do wonder to what extent if any France being instrumental in interdicting vaccines bound for Australia in March had on this outcome. I recall that around the same time the UK exported vaccines to Australia (see [1] ). Given it was Australia that approached the UK to initiate this deal towards the end of march, it may not have been the smartest move by France to demonstrate that they are not reliable and are perfectly willing to shaft Australia when the chips are down.
But of course we don't know if there was any relation at all between those events, the timings are suspicious tho.
[1] https://www.dw.com/en/australia-receives-astrazeneca-vaccine...
The contract was signed in 2019 after a complicated negociation and is only in the design phase.
If you go read the Australian reports on it, you will see that the main cause of delay is actually Australia. Contrary to France which has experience working on this kind of deal - they sold submarines to Brasil and India and boats to many more countries - Australia is not used to do this kind of work and it shows. The Morrison government however is all too happy to pin the blame on France especially considering the deal was mostly done by Turnbull.
If you expect the American contract to go smoothly and with no overrun, you are in for quite a surprise I fear.
* next year a new presidential election will take place in France
* Macron may use this contract cancellation as an opportunity to decrease France participation in NATO (technically it could leave the integrated command) as De Gaulle did before him.
This would allow him to capture more votes from the right as he would appears as a strong leader then, acting in continuity with General de Gaulle...
France can not go out of NATO, the alliance with all its drawbacks is just too important for its own defense.
This contract cancellation may end up being in the best interest of both Australia and France:
* Australia changed its mind in the course of the last years regarding what types of submarines it really needs.
* Such change of perspective affected the partnership in between both countries, which could have escalated into a costly commercial dispute where Australia would have acted in bad faith to prevent the French delivering what they did not want anymore.
There are tension in the Asia-Pacific regions in between the US and China, and France like other Europeans countries are too far from home to take a part in this.
France could. It has maintained a strategy of independence regarding its own defense. France has its own nukes, its own nuclear submarines, designs and operates its own fighters, has a nuclear powered aircraft carrier and has some limited capacity of projection. France has no American troops stationed on its soild and apart from the catapults of the carrier, none of their technologies come from the USA.
France has one of the lowest public opinion on NATO in the EU. I think France would be very much in favor of sidelining NATO for a EU force. The issue is the others members of the EU particularly in the east.
> France like other Europeans countries are too far from home to take a part in this.
France has mutiple territories in the Pacitic including New Caledonia which has a border with Australia.
No, it definitely is not. France defense is entierely built around its hability to launch a nuclear strike. Officialy the doctrine hasn't changed much since the fifties. France maintains the mean to destroy an unspecified number (it was estimated to be at least ten in the fifties) of cities in any country of the world which makes invading France strategically unsound in terms of cost.
France is not the UK. It has little illusion regarding its overall projection power or economic importance. No one in France thinks France is a superpower. That doesn't mean the French view themselves as impotent or insignificant. France remains a modern economy and a regional power which is quite proud of its culture and heritage and thinks it can influence its neighbors and allies for the best in an union which is large enough to stand on its own and defend its own values in an increasingly multipolars world.
From a French point of view, the EU shouldn't have to align itself with the USA or China to exist safely. If that means making concessions to Germany and the northern countries when it comes to how the economy should work and accepting long negociations in Brussels to reach agreements then so be it. That's the price of being an union and it's better than the alternative.
First, please read this gripping tale of the evolving national defense strategies of the United States and France within the "Indo Pacific" as seen during the change in foreign policy beginning with the later Obama years and the Trump administration: https://carnegieendowment.org/2020/10/21/france-other-indo-p...
One of the tl;drs of the link above is that France sees the Indo Pacific MUCH differently from many other western powers including the USA and UK. They see themselves having a prominent authority in the Indo Pacific, key to their economic interests. To this end, they have been trying to establish an alliance of powers in the region including Australia and India.
France actually pulled off a coup earlier this decade when they closed on a major Military Air Craft sale to India with their Dassault Rafale. They have been similarly trying to establish long term military relationships with Australia and thus align the two countries' interests.
The interests that France has in the region are about safeguarding their own economic concerns and not necessarily directly address the rise of the communist party of China.
This is in stark contrast to the UK, the US and Australia who see the rise of the communist partys ambitions directly threaten their countries defense and economic concerns.
There is going to be a lot of drama after this because what just happened here is a domino fell. We're seeing the emergence of an alliance that could form part of the "Quad" in the region or something similar that may not necessarily have France as the central power directing diplomacy in the region.