After reading Kenneth Timmerman's condemnation of France's $100 billion profiteering from Saddam's cruel regime (The French War For Oil), and my own recent article (From Madrid to Paris), some commentators expressed the view that France is just an ordinary country defending its interests and is no different than any other country, including the U.S. Indeed, for some in the anti-war camp France is even assumed to be necessarily a morally superior nation.

This view is so thoroughly ignorant of French foreign policy realities that it should really be put to rest once and for all...