Johnson Seeks to Smooth Ruffled French Feathers in Sub Spat
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Prime Minister Boris Johnson sought to calm a war of words with France after a French official accused the U.K. of being a U.S. vassal state for its role in an Indo-Pacific defense deal with Australia.
French ministers reacted with fury to the cooperation, which led to the cancellation of a French contract to supply diesel submarines to Australia. French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said the deal smacked of “permanent opportunism” and called Johnson the “fifth wheel on the carriage.”
France’s minister for Europe, Clement Beaune, described the agreement as “a return into the American form of accepted vassalization.”