France's Creeping Mission in the Central African Republic.

'Raising awareness of a tiny African country today as she trudges around Whitehall is Oxfam's humanitarian policy adviser, Emma Fanning, who has recently returned from the Central African Republic. The UK has a vital role to play in the face of massive human suffering, she says' ( Twenty years after the genocide, we have learnt nothing from Rwanda. Linda Melver, The Guardian, Friday 4 April 2014 )

'Humanitarian intervention' again. EU troops have already been sent to CAR, mostly France the ex-colonial power until 1960, in order to try to stabilise the country and thus procure control over its copious resources of gold, oil uranium ( important for France's nuclear power plants ) and diamonds.

The idea that European powers such as Britain have a missionary role to play in Africa, one which has a moral duty to bring peace and prosperity to benighted lands and, of course, benefit itself economically, has been advocated consistently by liberal internationalists once more since the end of the 1990s.

In the first decade of the 21st century, both Britain and France saw the emergence of the 'military-humanitarian complex', wherby groups such as Oxfam and Save the Children have been coopted by government and politicians to advance European power interests and alleviate humanitarian distress.

The question that has remained unresolved in other mineral rich lands such as Afghanistan, where western troops mission to defeat the Taliban and ensure the construction of the geopolitically vital TAPI pipeline, is whether decisive political intervention to remove a bad regime has made things better or worse.

France's foreign policy has continued to use the humanitarian imperative as a way of giving a means to legitimise its pursuit of access to resources. Sarkozy and Hollande were particularly keen on a military strike on Syria to remove Assad so as to advance its oil and gas interests in Qatar and weapons sales.

With regards CAR, the African Union already has peacekeepers on the ground. The reason France was so keen to muscle in December 2013, as it had repeatedly attempted to meddle in CAR and get a regime that would be more useful in securing its resource interests.

This is in continuity with attempts as recent as 2006-2007 to use Dassault Mirage jets to bombard insurgent positions opposed to President Bozize who won the elections in 2005 ( after staging a coup in 2003 ) but has always ruled in order to benefit only his own cronies.

Britain is unlikely to want to get involved in CAR unless it were to have greater mining interests. The main interest France has is in continuing to preserve its uranium mining concessions and in diamonds, one reason it bankrolled the regime of Emperor Bokassa I in the 1970s.

In 1979 French paratroopers removed Bokassa in Operation Barracuda when his regime started slaughtering students and schoolchildren in the poorer areas of Bangui. The difference this time is that the Seleka rebels are not the only insurgents and, as in Syria, many are vying with one another over resources.

Civil war and ethnic cleansing, chaos and near genocide are hardly conditions under which Britain would contribute troops while France has made it clear that it's troops are not there to save Bozize's regime so much as protect its biggest uranium mining investment at Bakouma from anti-Bozize insurgents.

Compare and contrast what Hollande was saying as regards the CAR with France's outrage at Assad's inhumanity in Syria and the duty to intervene, one paralleled in Britain by William Hague following Assad's alleged CW attack in Ghouta, and it's clear humanitarianism is not much of a consideration,

“If we are present, it is not to protect a regime, it is to protect our nationals and our interests, and in no way to intervene in the internal affairs of a country...Those days are gone.”

The problem now is that with Bozize having been deposed, the conflict in CAR over who grabs what is set to intensify as the country descends into sectarian warfare between Christian militias and Islamists. As with Afghanistan, there is already talk of 'mission creep' and being sucked into a deepening war.

Syrian Crisis: France's Stance and Its Strategic Partnerships.

“I am struck by how eager Great Britain and France appear to be in favour of military action. And I am also mindful of the fact that both of these two powers are former imperialist, colonialist powers in the region.” -former US National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski

France has been more hawkish over Syria throughout the conflict there than either Britain or even the US. When news of the alleged chemical weapons strike on East Ghouta broke on 21 August, the French Foreign Minister, Laurent Fabius, was first out calling for a 'reaction with force'.

A continuous stream of the most belligerent rhetoric has emanated from Paris since then, with calls from President Hollande that France was 'ready to punish' Assad to Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault claiming the attack involved a "massive use of chemical agents".

France's knowledge about Syria's chemical weapons stock may come from the fact that in the 1980s it was French pharmaceuticals that were imported for 'dual use purposes'. The French dossier is technically specific about Syrian CW capabilities but adds nothing towards exact responsibility for the attacks.

The 'public diplomacy' behind the dossier is to back up Washington's version on Saturday and John Kerry's rhetoric about 'we know' everything and 'we have assessed'. Indeed France has been more persistent in backing the Syrian opposition than the US as it was responsible for setting up 'Friends of Syria'.

The 'Friends of Syria Group' or 'Friends of the Syrian People Group' was set up in June 2012 by Sarkozy to bolster support for the Syrian National Council and to prepare for a post-Assad government. The aim is 'revolution' but the reality from the French perspective is its national interests.

France is a staunch ally and strategic partner of Saudi Arabia and Qatar both in the Friends of Syria Group and which support militias with arms and money against Assad. French military ties with the oil rich kingdom have put it at the forefront of the push to directly provide weapons to the Syria rebels.

The FT reported on June 21 2013 an analyst close to ruling circles, Jamal Khashoggi, revealing that Saudi Arabia would never let its Persian Gulf rival Iran 'win a victory in Syria' because Assad had had the upper hand until the alleged chemical weapons attack by his regime occurred.

'”Saudi Arabia has to do something now, even if it will do it alone. The goal now must be toppling Bashar, even if the US is not involved. If Saudi Arabia leads the way, Sunni tribes and o ther countries, including France, will eventually join.”

France, concerned that Syrian opposition forces are losing ground, has suggested it is ready to push ahead with increasing the scale of equipment it supplies to the rebels, but it remains coy on what weapons it may be prepared to include.

Officials said this week that Paris had already “ticked the boxes” of materiel it was willing to deliver on a list presented to the Friends of Syria members by the Free Syrian Army. But they declined to say what these included.'

France's defence of Saudi Arabia's policy in Syria so as to check Iran, its main regional geopolitical rival and Shia enemy, is a lucrative and mutually beneficial partnership. On the August 30 news broke of 'a billion euro defence contract with Saudi Arabia to overhaul four frigates and two refuelling ships'.

France's bilateral ties with Qatar, the other main funder of the Islamist militias, brings numerous benefits from Total's stake in the liquefied natural gas ( LNG ) market and the supply of it as an increasing part of the gas energy portfolio for north west Europe via France's EDF group.

France's energy policy is interconnected to geopolitical strategy and competition with Russia and Gazprom for control over the global market for LNG. The volume of Qatari LNG threatens to displace the importance of Russian gas. The proposed Qatar-Turkey pipeline would rival Russian imports and so it backs Assad.

France's interest in energy diversification coincides with many EU states. However, only France ( apart from Britain ) is a military power that can assert those energy security interests in the Middle East. More than that, Qatar invests billions of petrodollars in French real estate and grand projets.

Syria: The Position of France.

French President Francois Hollande has made it clear he intends to side firmly with President Obama and the USA by threatening to intervene militarily against Assad in Syria over his alleged use of chemical weapons in Ghouta, east of Damascus. France has been the most hawkish of all the powers on Syria.

In being prepared to act with the USA, Hollande, a nominal socialist, is appearing to take the position of Tony Blair who was seen as GW Bush's 'poodle' in supporting him on military action against Iraq while the British Parliament last night rejected military action. But France's policies are not a great reversal.

France has a very strong tradition of realpolitik and national egotism which led it to oppose the invasion of Iraq in 2003 for commercial and energy reasons and for it to be the most hawkish for intervention in 2013 against Assad in Syria precisely a decade later on the same basis.

France was responsible under President Sarkozy for setting up the 'Friends of Syria' group which met in Istanbul on Monday. His successor Francois Hollande ramped up the rhetoric about the need for missile strikes to 'punish' those responsible for the alleged chemical weapon attack in Syria.

France has been at the forefront of advocating coercion as a logical extension of the policy of putting pressure on Assad to surrender power. A political transition on the terms of France and other Western nations involved in Friends of Syria has been the geopolitical goal since the civil war started in 2011.

At the Istanbul meeting one source stated “The opposition was told in clear terms that action to deter further use of chemical weapons by the Assad regime could come as early as in the next few days, and that they should still prepare for peace talks at Geneva”.

France is a strong strategic partner of Qatar and an enemy of Iran which is backing Assad and Hizbollah. France's Total Group has long-term access to liquefied natural gas resources in Qatar and supplies an important proportion of France's LNG needs. A corporate video here was made on the subject by Total.

Shoring up Qatar's strategic position against Iranian plans to export gas to the Mediterranean via a pipeline through Syria would be achieved through a rival pipeline planned from the South Pars gas field ( which Qatar shares with Iran ) towards Turkey which also backs the Muslim Brotherhood.

As energy expert Felix Imonti commented in the online magazine for specialists interested in the industry called Oilprice.com,

''Pipelines are in place already in Turkey to receive the gas. Only Al-Assad is in the way. Qatar along with the Turks would like to remove Al-Assad and install the Syrian chapter of the Moslim Brotherhood. It is the best organized political movement in the chaotic society and can block Saudi Arabia's efforts to install a more fanatical Wahhabi based regime. Once the Brotherhood is in power, the Emir's broad connections with Brotherhood groups throughout the region should make it easy for him to find a friendly ear and an open hand in Damascus.'

Gas rich Qatar also invests vast amounts of money in the French economy, not least to revive depressed suburbs of large French cities which are prone to disorder and riots from alienated youths often holding radical Islamist ideas and viscerally detesting France's 'global role'.

President Hollande's policy with Qatar is firmly within the mould set by Sarkozy is offering strategic assistance to Qatar in return for lucrative Qatari investments which the French foreign ministry put at $15 billion, not including those of the Emir and family relations.

France's backing for Friends of Syria and Qatar's regional ambitions is based on a mutually beneficial partnership and pursuit of ruthless strategic ambitions not mentioned by papers such as Le Monde which reacted to the alleged chemical weapon attack with the headline 'Indignation is Not Enough'.

Appendix: Arms Deals

The urge in France to be at the forefront of advocating coercion to force Assad 'to go' is that it has joined a race to please Qatar and extend the benefits of Qatari petrodollars in promoting the task of job creation as President Hollande would as a 'socialist'.

The Financial Times reported as follows on Hollande's position

“We have reached a balance (of bilateral investments) and wish to preserve that and want to increase the volume of that exchange,” he told a news conference in Doha, noting that France was trailing behind the UK and Germany in the race to lure Qatari petrodollars.

Qatar, which has been flexing its financial muscle since the credit crisis, has made several investments in French companies and real estate, amounting to as much as $15bn in the past few years. The ruling family has also invested significant amounts of money in Paris.

The British government, as represented by Chancellor Osborne, is mentioning how Parliament's rejection of military action in Syria is about 'whether Britain wants to play a big part in upholding the international system, be that a big open and trading nation that I'd like us to be or whether we turn our back on that".

France wants to maintain its primacy as the main arms dealer to Qatar as well, in particular lucrative sales of  French Rafale fighter jets made by Dassault . In June in Doha, Hollande stated, during talks on Syria about  Assad's position, and with evident satisfaction and pleasure,

"We supply light and modern arms to the Qatari army. I made new proposals for air, land and naval defence. I am quite confident that we will make progress in each of these areas...France will always be there for Qatar to ensure its defence and security,"

The British government is going to be concerned that it could fall out of favour with Qatar and lose prestige and influence now that the annoying problem of democracy has got in the way of Cameron, Johnson and Osborne potentially losing ground to France and other Friends of Syria with these lucrative interests.