Alliance Francaise

Here on the front lines of the "global war on terrorism," one does not expect to be eating canapes with goose liver pate and an onion confiture. But this is the situation I find myself in just an hour after arriving aboard the French warship Premier Maitre L'Her in the Gulf of Aden, patrolling the busy sea between Somalia and Yemen. The United States believes that, along with the countless fishing dhows and cargo boats that ply these waters, there are illicit arms shipments and Al Qaeda leaders in transit. And the Americans have entrusted, of all people, the French to help stop them.Regardless of what certain cable news outlets, politicians, and Donald Rumsfeld would have you believe, France is an active military ally of the United States. Sure, it led worldwide opposition to the invasion of Iraq, but French jets bombed targets in Afghanistan from the aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle. There are French special forces teams patrolling the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. French maritime aircraft scan the seas of the Middle East under the aegis of the United States Central Command (centcom). And, as of this August, France commands Combined Task Force 150 (CTF 150)--a constant naval patrol of the sea lanes around Pakistan, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and the Horn of Africa--of which the PM L'Her is a member. Although the task force is organized by centcom, operational command rotates among participating navies and is now held by a French vice admiral who oversees the operations of American, French, German, Italian, and Pakistani ships. When you talk to military officials actually involved in the war on terrorism, French-bashing is noticeably absent. In the preface to the French- English military dictionary used by the officers aboard the PM L'Her, former American naval attache to France, Captain Don Fennessey, wrote: "Through the quirks of military and political expediency, and despite fierce nationalistic, historical and cultural forces which would normally cause us to do otherwise, in the world of allied military operations, the anglophones and francophones certainly will be working side-by-side in real world crises and in training exercises for the foreseeable future. Therefore, it is necessary for our militaries to communicate effectively, even if our political leaders aren't speaking to each other." (Some of the baroqueness of the French language seems to have rubbed off on Captain Fennessey during his time in Paris.) Even fighting the war on terrorism, the French lose none of their elan. The goose liver pate is just the appetizer for my first meal on board the PM L'Her-- soon will come a delicate Jambon a la Russe, then pasta with fresh barracuda bought during the ship's last port call in Oman, followed by a dessert of brioche with pear sauce. And this is lunch. But, as is often the case with the French, the officers' effortless grace is occasionally punctuated by episodes of odd taste. There is ketchup on the table, and the sailors rib me about Americans' alleged overuse of the condiment. But the first to put ketchup on his barracuda pasta is Lieutenant-Commander Thierry Catard, the ship's debonair captain. A couple of the other officers follow suit. I'm not sure if it's to make me feel at home, but I give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that it is. The officers say that the French public is barely aware that their navy is cooperating with the United States, and they are generally not interested in discussions about political disputes between Paris and Washington. The closest I get to a culture clash is when the officers tease me about the ubiquity of Starbucks, and it is noted that there are now a handful of franchises in Paris offering mochaccinos to compete with stand-up espresso. And the sailors are amazed that Americans don't seem to think much about the connection between our withdrawal from the Kyoto Protocol and the prevalence of violent storms like Hurricane Katrina. Soon after lunch, a small dhow without a flag or radio is spotted from the bridge. Catard decides to send a motorboat out to conduct what CTF 150 calls an "intel stop," in which the coalition sailors ask for permission to board the dhow, offer the men (in this case Yemeni fishermen) bottled water and French cookies and candy, and ask if there are smugglers or Al Qaeda types nearby. The Yemenis haven't seen anything suspicious, but they are friendly and they show off how much tuna they've caught. The dhow captain jokes that the catch is so good he has no need for the $25 million bounty on Osama bin Laden's head. The French sailors also take pictures and note the ship's registry, owner, and captain. On their return to the PM L'Her, they transmit the photos and information to CTF 150 headquarters in Bahrain, where it goes into a massive database, so that the coalition can track individuals' travels and note suspicious patterns. (For the duration of the French ship's time with the task force, the U.S. Navy has installed a special networking system onboard so the vessel can communicate with the other ships in CTF 150.) The PM L'Her has yet to come across any terrorists or contraband during its two months in the area, but Catard explains that building the database makes it easier to identify legitimate traffic patterns so that the bad guys are easier to spot. By now, the database is large enough that the majority of boats the task force stops have already been entered into it. Catard says the constant allied presence in these waters has a deterrent effect and that fishermen have told him that pirates, once plentiful in the area, have gone dormant. Nevertheless, it is still considered too dangerous to board suspect ships at night. When the sun sets, the bridge continues to monitor traffic and track suspicious boats so they can be checked out more thoroughly in the morning. But most officers relax by watching soccer highlights on an Arab satellite sports channel or smoking Gauloises on the deck. Then it's time for dinner, an indication that perhaps France and the United States aren't that far apart after all: Tonight, in the stateroom, we eat pizza.

By joshua kucera; Joshua Kucera is a staff reporter in the Washington bureau of Jane's Defence Weekly.