A jont declaration from France, Germany, and Russia this afternoon, saying they 'will not allow' a UN respolution to pass them, if it authorizes war against Iraq.
Surprised? I think not somehow..
At the joint press conference the Foreign Ministers of those countries, it was France's Dominique de Villepin who actually did the talking, while Germany nodded in blank agreement and Russia was caught looking rather nervously towards the wings, as though on third, dreading the call from the dugout, to steal home..
Colin Powell has made another call for the world to look at the reality of the situation, stressing that nobody wants to live in a world where the United Nations means nothing.. intimating that should that august body, through the veto's of France and Russia stymie this Resolution, then that's exactly the impression the world would have. The US is certainly going to go this alone, well with Britain if nobody else.. and that would be a massive slap in the face to the French.. the Russians.. the Germans..
Perhaps enough for them to dissolve historic ties the likes of NATO, so as to concentrate their attentions, and their budgets, on the formation of an European Army..
It's historically something piddly.. something intrinsically 'small', that starts the ball rolling on matters monumental..