November 13, 2004 -- Quick: What Western power bypassed the U.N. recently, ignored the inter national community and launched a pre-emptive attack against the forces of a sovereign foreign government?
Why . . . France, of course.

That's right: French forces, acting unilaterally, deployed troops to strike the Ivory Coast's air force and took up strategic sites in the country's commercial center of Abidjan last Sunday.

Indeed, in what is being called a complete "overreaction," the French virtually wiped out the West African cocoa-producing nation's entire combat air fleet.

(True, that included just a few old Russian jets and some choppers. But what do you expect from the French?)

And, so far, the closest thing to WMDs that's been found is . . . chocolate. (It can lead to deadly obesity, n'est-ce pas?)

Which raises a question: Did that cowboy, Jacques Chirac, fear President Laurent Gbagbo's forces would attack Paris?

Chirac's troops rushed to war after Gbagbo's warplanes hit a French Army post in his nation. Nine French soldiers (and an American) were killed, but Ivorians are so outraged by the French "occupation," they've rioted, violently.

The irony in the strike by the French, who criticized President Bush's war against a real threat in Iraq, is, of course, hilarious. France did what it wanted (but don't expect U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to call it "illegal").

The serious side is that France really does mean to continue its colonial influence in that part of Africa, and has essentially sided with the rebels against the government. You'd think the "world community" — and America's anti-war Left — would be up in arms.



Quels hypocrites!

should be quel not quels...