A PLAN

For Peace

Allain Juppe, French Foreign Minister, appeared at The Brookings Institute under the title of the Arab Spring- and gave a comprehensive unbattle plan for peace. He noted that the uprisings are not controlled as far as he can tell by one threatening menacing Islamicist group but should be welcomed and embraced by all liberty loving human rights watching people as the youthful vigor throws off oppressive regimes that for far too long got a western pass.
Allain Juppe appears poised, intellegent, impecably scripted with a graceful French accented tilt, and would sound elegant if he stood behind a podium and recited "I do not like green eggs and Ham" but instead he gave a thoughtful serious presentation on why protecting joint American-French interests compel certain responses that have not been universally popular, even in America.
The audience questioning is always telling in terms of where the Court of Public Opinion will likely rule- and one agitated gentleman suggested that after the ICC indictment of Khadaffi that
a US Counsel on Foreign Relations person quoted thought that the Benghazi massacre was overstated and we are thus once again the Agressor. The hostile questioner said NATO stood for something like Naked Aggression Toward Others and wondered if the ICC would indict the French or us. Juppe noted that 10,000-15,000 people have already died at Khadaffi's instruction and we are nowhere nearing that mark and that Khadaffi's indictment at the ICC was a fait accompli.
It was a rather gracious response to a rather 'whackadoodle' American question. Juppe won.
He noted also that come September the UN will see a messy bit of business with Palestinians trying to engage a vote on the statehood issue, and if something is not done sooner over the summer American diplomacy will fail. He offered to have a Parisian Peace Process over the summer.
Can't hurt. Sign me up. Call me Allain Juppe. Serious. 202-241-3558 or have Roland Celette at the Embassy get in touch with me. Whether the official channels make a go of it I can help pull it off. -Or, friend me on http://www.bonjourdc.org/ the new french Facebook at La Maison:-)

Ask for Cynthia.