THE English occupied the Breton seaport of Saint-Malo throughout the Middle Ages, and President Chirac and the French Prime Minister, Mr Lionel Jospin, chose a castle built after the final departure of the English in the 15th century to receive the British Prime Minister, Mr Blair, late yesterday.
European defence is the main topic at the 21st annual Franco-British summit. Mr Blair surprised Paris in October by calling for a stronger defence role for the EU, especially in crises such as Bosnia, Albania and Kosovo. Britain resisted such moves in the past, out of fear they could weaken NATO and Britain's defence links with the US.
The French and British Defence Ministers are to sign a letter of intent on closer co-operation in crisis management and military operations on board the frigate HMS Birmingham in Saint-Malo harbour this morning. And Mr Chirac, Mr Blair and Mr Jospin may issue an unprecedented joint communique on European defence which could determine the fate of the Western European Union, Europe's largely theoretical defence arm.
It appears likely that the WEU's negligible military assets will be transferred to NATO control, while its political elements may become a "fourth pillar" of the EU, comparable to the US National Security Council.
In the best tradition of Franco-British relations, Mr Blair's initiative has the French searching for ulterior motives. Some see it as the only way Mr Blair could prove himself to be a European, at a time when opinion polls show only 55 per cent of his compatriots want to stay in the EU and 61 per cent oppose joining EMU.
Others see the defence move as a US Trojan Horse, devised to pull France back into the NATO integrated command which it left in 1966. Mr Chirac's 1996-1997 attempts to reintegrate France floundered when Washington refused to entrust the southern command to a European.
France seems to suffer from unrequited affection for Britain. A poll in December, 1997, showed that 82 per cent of French people like Mr Blair, while only 11 per cent of Britons said they liked Mr Jospin.
Likewise, 50 per cent of the French expressed sympathie for the British people, of whom only 35 per cent returned the compliment. But if the French like Mr Blair, they are not so sure about his ideology. Le Monde has called Mr Blair's "third way" (between capitalism and socialism) "the yellow brick road that leads to the Wizard of Oz".
To the extent that it is understood in France, the "third way" is considered an Anglo-American plot to dismantle public services and destroy the social safety net.
Until the British press turned its fury on the German Finance Minister, Mr Oskar Lafontaine, this week, it had indulged in an outbreak of Francophobia. This was prompted by Le Figaro's investigation of French bathing habits, France's refusal to extradite the renegade agent, Mr David Shayler, and unfounded allegations that Paris tipped off Baghdad about an imminent US bombardment last month.
