Brakelite
Well-Known Member
Tahiti is French, and New Caledonia, French Polynesia, and Wallis and Fortuna.That confused me that the French were able to test bombs around NZ, I didn't know they owned islands in the South Pacific.
When discussing Washington’s partners in the Pacific, the conversation usually focuses on coordination with Australia and New Zealand. What is often overlooked is the role France plays in the region. The fact that France holds three territories in the South Pacific—New Caledonia, Wallis and Futuna, and French Polynesia—accounting for about one third of the Pacific Islands’ combined exclusive economic zone (EEZ), is frequently forgotten.
France’s territories have historically been isolated from the rest of the region by a linguistic barrier and their unique trading relationship with Europe. France also limited its own opportunities to engage the independent states of the Pacific by directing aid exclusively to its territories. This situation began to change in 1996 with France’s decision to cease nuclear testing in the Pacific—long a point of contention with the rest of the region. France has signaled a willingness to participate in regional politics and has become a force to watch as it more actively engages the independent island states and reaches new milestones in decolonization.
The United States’ relationship with France in the Pacific remains secondary to its partnerships with Australia and New Zealand. Few U.S. government statements even mention France as a Pacific partner, despite the two countries’ strong trans-Atlantic cooperation. There are three main reasons for this. First, France’s Pacific colonies are isolated from primary U.S. concerns in the region—too far away from the United States’ territories and associated states to the north, too stable to engender concern, and historically too detached from the rest of the region.
Second, France lacks significant strategic resources in the region, particularly since most of the French military presence left the Pacific once nuclear testing ceased. And third, engaging too closely could shine a light on the United States’ own controversial history of nuclear testing and relations with its Pacific territories.
U.S.-French cooperation in the Pacific has mostly been limited to the Quadrilateral Defense Coordination Group, in which the United States, Australia, and New Zealand work with France on shared interests such as fisheries management. France also joined Australia, New Zealand, and other partner countries in contributing personnel to the U.S. Navy-led Pacific Partnership annual missions in 2011 and 2012, which provided aid and health care to nations across the Pacific and Southeast Asia. Pacific Partnership 2013 will see the inclusion of personnel from the French Armed Forces New Caledonia.