NEWS FROM THE OLD EUROPE:

Chirac is walking a political tightrope at home, where public opinion is set against any military action not sanctioned by the UN and where an immigrant population of four million Muslims exercises an unspoken influence on policy.

Muslim youths in Paris and other cities are carrying out a low-level “intifada” against French authority, burning cars in nightly raids, mostly unreported in the national news. The risk of escalating violence is real.

In other words, French policy is the victim not of American imperialism, but of Arab colonialism, no?