Detente Cordiale?

Charles de Gaulle, who in private conversation once described President Kennedy as an "adversary," has been getting along no better with the Johnson Administration. From NATO to the U.N., Latin America to Red China, there is hardly an issue or an area in world politics on which France has not taken a stand at variance with U.S. policy. The activities of some French officials in Southeast Asia often lead exasperated U.S. diplomats stationed there to wonder if France is not actually trying to thwart U.S. efforts to keep the area from falling to the Communists.

Cordial Cooperation. Paris is apparently awakening to the dangers of its widening policy differences with Washington. De Gaulle is said to have decided that it is time to switch to a more harmonious tone in his relations with the US.--not only because disharmony weakens the West, but also because he hopes thereby to lessen U.S. resistance to his vision of a French-dominated confederation of European states. When President Johnson recently proposed that U.S. Under Secretary of State George Ball go to Paris to review the Administration's latest plans for military and diplomatic resistance to Communist encroachment in Southeast Asia, De Gaulle was a model of cordial cooperation. He did not quibble at the fact that Ball was of less than Cabinet rank, nor did he demand to know in advance precisely what Ball wanted to talk about. Then word came from Paris that longtime Ambassador to the U.S. Herve Alphand would be replaced in the coming months. Alphand and his elegant wife Nicole had been close to the Kennedys, but showed little interest in L.B.J. before his accession to power ("I suppose we will have to learn zee bar-bee-cue," sniffed Nicole when Johnson became President).

Ancient Grudge. The new tone with Washington would be welcome, but no one dared expect any basic change in France's policies. De Gaulle would hardly budge from his belief that eventual neutralization of Southeast Asia, with guarantees from Red China, was "the only solution compatible with the peaceful life and progress of the area." France's view is understandably colored by memories of its own defeat in Indo-China. The U.S. does not exclude the possibility that South Viet Nam may be neutralized, but Washington insists that the country must first be made sufficiently strong to protect itself against a Communist takeover. Meanwhile, if France and the U.S. reach no sudden entente, there are hopes at least of a Detente cordiale between the two allies.

Of course, De Gaulle's relations with Washington and London have been strained ever since his escape to England from occupied France in 1940. Most of all, he is still irked at the Allies' refusal to allow Free French troops to join the Normandy invasion. In memory of that snub, France's President and his leading ministers were conspicuously absent from ceremonies honoring the 20th anniversary of the D-day landings.

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