Mistral Saga: Igor Sechin Se Moque De Paris - The Jamestown Foundation

The French ambassador to Estonia, Frederic Billet, has asked the host country to look positively at the French sale of Mistral-class warships to Russia. The ambassador told Estonian media that the warship sale is meant to demonstrate the end of the Cold War with Russia; and the ships would be sold without armaments on board, practically as civilian vessels (Eesti Paevaleht cited by Interfax, July 15).

Portraying the Mistral sale (and other proposed arms sales to Russia) as political demonstrations of the Cold War’s end, is a standard talking point for French representatives abroad. Internally, however, President Nicolas Sarkozy’s administration seems to fall back on a late-nineteenth century view of European politics to justify a Franco-Russian special partnership, evolving towards an alliance. Le Figaro’s editorial page, often used by the Elysee Palace as a mouthpiece, propagates this view.

Mistral Saga: Igor Sechin Se Moque De Paris - The Jamestown Foundation