French troops form the bulk of a newly deployed European Union peace-keeping force in Chad and the (completely misnamed) Central African Republic intended to protect relief workers and streamline delivery of humanitarian aid to the starving population in Darfur. Eventually, this force will reach 3,700 troops from 14 countries, now that Austria has also signed up.
This is the largest peace-keeping force ever deployed by the European Union (and it's six months late due to internal bickering) as an entity that doesn't (A) revolve around a US cadre or (B) function as a subsidiary of the UN.
There are two ways to look at this.
One is to be pleased that the damn Europeans are finally getting off their butts and taking responsibility for some of the world's hot spots, so we don't have to....
Or you can recognize that France is carefully positioning itself in all kinds of ways to rival the US as a major geo-political player around the globe, competing under an entirely new paradigm that our current crop of wannabe Presidents don't even understand....
(By the way, this is again from Al Jazeera, because US media doesn't cover it.)
This is the largest peace-keeping force ever deployed by the European Union (and it's six months late due to internal bickering) as an entity that doesn't (A) revolve around a US cadre or (B) function as a subsidiary of the UN.
There are two ways to look at this.
One is to be pleased that the damn Europeans are finally getting off their butts and taking responsibility for some of the world's hot spots, so we don't have to....
Or you can recognize that France is carefully positioning itself in all kinds of ways to rival the US as a major geo-political player around the globe, competing under an entirely new paradigm that our current crop of wannabe Presidents don't even understand....
(By the way, this is again from Al Jazeera, because US media doesn't cover it.)
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