Cablegate: Socialist Party Leader On How Ps-Led France Would

This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 PARIS 004247

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E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/07/2015
TAGS: PGOV ELAB EU FR PINR SOCI ECON
SUBJECT: SOCIALIST PARTY LEADER ON HOW PS-LED FRANCE WOULD
APPROACH U.S.: "NEITHER BLAIR NOR CHIRAC"

REF: PARIS 3725

Classified By: Ambassador Craig Stapleton for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d)

SUMMARY
-------
1. (C) Socialist Party (PS) First Secretary Francois
Hollande and PS National Secretary for International Affairs
Pierre Moscovici briefed the Ambassador June 8 on the
turbulent race for the presidential nomination within the PS
and the hurdles facing the party as it looks to next year's
presidential and legislative elections. Hollande underlined
that, notwithstanding Poitou-Charentes Region President
Segolene Royal's commanding lead today in polls, both among
the public at large and among PS members, PS members'
convictions as to which PS leader "is best placed to beat
Sarkozy" could well change between now and the PS's
presidential primary in November. Hollande nonetheless
believed the primary would produce a clear cut result,
"probably in just one round." Asked what might be expected
from French foreign policy under a socialist government,
Hollande used the phrase "neither Blair and Chirac" to
characterize an overall stance towards the U.S. that would
not be uncritically supportive, but also not be gratuitously
obstructionist. On Europe, Moscovici stressed that a
Socialist president and government would be much more
pro-Europe than President Chirac and the government of Prime
Minister Dominique de Villepin. END SUMMARY.

ATMOSPHERICS
-------------
2. (C) Over breakfast with the Ambassador at the residence
on June 8, Socialist Party (PS) First Secretary Francois
Hollande and PS National Secretary for International Affairs
Pierre Moscovici were confident, optimistic and dismissive of
the drumbeat of media reports that insist that frictions and
divisions within the PS will make it difficult for the party
to close ranks behind a single candidate for the 2007
presidential race even after the party primary next November.

UPCOMING ELECTIONS WILL BE HARD FOUGHT
--------------------------------------
3. (C) Hollande and Moscovici predicted that the 2007
presidential and legislative elections would be particularly
hard fought because neither of the two major parties "can
count on more than 30 percent of the electorate." (Note: The
center-left PS and the center-right Union for a Popular
Movement (UMP) are the preponderant parties in a political
spectrum that includes the small, centrist Union for French
Democracy (UDF) party along with a range of micro parties.
Indeed, if the pattern of past presidential elections holds
in 2007, there will be over a dozen candidates competing in
the first round of the election. End note.) Hollande
suggested that, since neither of the major parties can aspire
to majority status, the UDF might well find itself with
leverage beyond its size, particularly if in the legislative
elections that follow the presidential election, neither the
PS nor the UMP win a near majority of seats. Hollande added
that, in both the presidential and legislative elections, the
Communist Party (PC) and other far-left parties "would vote
against the right," but not join in any socialist government
in the event of a PS-led legislature.

4. (C) Hollande expressed his firm conviction that the PS
was well-positioned to win both the presidential and
legislative contests, but that both elections will be
extremely close. Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, barring
an unexpected reverse, would be the center-right's candidate,
and -- according to Hollande -- will benefit from the active
support of President Chirac, "if Sarkozy is nice to him."
That is, according to Hollande, if Sarkozy agrees to look
after Chirac loyalists and, by implication, Chirac himself.
(Note: Chirac will lose his immunity from prosecution upon
leaving office; corruption charges for political financing
activities dating from before he became president remain
pending against him. End note.) Hollande said that he did
not believe that Chirac would prefer to see the PS candidate
take the presidency rather than see Sarkozy become his
successor. Even so, Hollande also spoke of the bitterly
personal, "fratricidal" rivalries on the center-right,
comparing them to the less personal, more ideological
rivalries in his center-left, PS.

THE CHALLENGE OF REFORM WITHOUT A MANDATE
-----------------------------------------
5. (C) Hollande said that whoever wins the presidency in
2007, the electoral system and divisions in the electorate
are such that the victor will not have a "mandate for
reform," and certainly not a mandate in the majority
rule/winner-takes-all "American" sense of the term. This
meant that reforms would come slowly, if at all. However,
Hollande also ruled out the possibility of a president from
one party and a parliamentary majority from another, saying
that he believed the back-to-back presidential and
legislative elections would both reflect the voters' decision
for change. This would help, Hollande said, to bring about
some significant reforms, albeit slowly.

UPBEAT ABOUT THE STATE OF THE PS
--------------------------------
6. (C) Hollande was bullish and buoyant about the state of
the PS. He pointed to the party's recent consensus on its
"project for 2007" -- a platform statement that all the
party's presidential hopefuls agreed to with little argument
-- as evidence of the party's stability and unity, even as he
allowed that it would not be binding on the various
candidates. Hollande and Moscovici agreed that recent
meetings to hammer out the platform were, by PS standards,
rather non-eventful, and the press coverage of rejection of
proposals by Royal and others "highly exaggerated."

7. (C) Hollande proudly underlined the policy statement's
call for enhanced social programs, while admitting, when
pressed, that implementing everything it calls for might
prove a little "expensive." (Comment: Indeed, differences
over the likely cost of the PS's electoral program (Hollande
cites the figure of 30 billion Euros, whereas Strauss-Kahn
has said the price tag is closer to 50 billion) are sure to
fuel controversy over the proposal and PS candidate's
commitment to implementing it if elected. End Comment.)
Hollande added that the electoral program's "social
dimension" could help the PS attract center-right "Gaullist
voters" disaffected with the UMP's free-market liberalism.

PREDICTS A ONE-ROUND PRIMARY
----------------------------
8. (C) Hollande confidently predicted that the PS would
unify behind whoever wins the primary in the interest of
victory -- though he conceded that primaries can sometimes
weaken rather than strengthen a candidate. He defended the
November date for party's choosing of a candidate, saying
that, had the candidate been chosen now, he/she would have
been subjected to a potentially crippling drumbeat of
criticism from the right. Hollande also confidently
predicted that the PS's November primary would produce a
clear cut winner, "probably in just one round." Hollande
said that, above all, party members "want a winner" and will
therefore support the candidate most likely to beat Sarkozy
in a putative, second round run-off.

ROYAL
-----
9. (C) Hollande strongly implied that that candidate could
easily be Royal, saying that if the primary were held today,
"she will win and be the candidate," barring a sharp downturn
in her popularity in the pitiless triage of an intensifying
presidential campaign.
Hollande noted that Royal is not part of the traditional
party establishment, and commented that the attacks against
her have only served to make her all the more popular.
Referring to her opponents among the socialists, Hollande
said that those who resented her sudden success, and took
cheap shots at her, were as a practical matter, "acting as
her allies." Hollande wondered out loud if her popularity
would last, accurately identifying that as the key question
about her candidacy. Several times he mentioned the
unpredictability of politics, making clear that he believed
much could happen between now and next May's first round of
the presidential election that could turn upside down "the
givens of today." In particular, Hollande evoked how a major
international crisis -- he gave Iran as an example -- might
completely change the dynamics of the upcoming elections.

CAREFUL NOT TO RULE OUT HIS OWN CANDIDACY
-----------------------------------------
10. (C) Hollande was careful to make clear that he too was
prepared to run as a unifying candidate, but only if it
seemed to him he would be likely to win the party primary --
hands down in the first round. He was categorical in ruling
out that that he would not/not run "out of pride" or "to get
10 percent of the vote." (Comment: Clearly, the only
circumstances under which Hollande would be likely to win big
in the primary, is if Royal for some reason drops out. End
Comment.)

FABIUS
------
11. (C) Hollande contrasted his "team player" attitude with
what he dismissively called former prime minister Laurent
Fabius' "accountant" mentality, saying, "just because 20
percent of the party supports him, he thinks that entitles
him to 20 percent of whatever the party does." Almost as an
afterthought, Hollande added "no matter what, Fabius will
run."

EUROPE
------
12. (C) Moscovici said that a PS administration would be much
more pro-Europe than President Chirac and Prime Minister de
Villepin (see also reftel). Both Hollande and Moscovici saw
a need to use Europe to consolidate defense industries and
reduce defense expenditures through economies of scale.
Hollande noted sardonically that France was unable to sell
its fighters and tanks to anyone. Moscovici saw a need for
an increased parliamentary role in policy-making related to
Europe, complaining that there was currently too much power
concentrated in the presidency. Hollande described the
absurd situation where the prime minister, who does not
participate in European Council meetings, represents the
government during the question-and-answer sessions in the
National Assembly to defend policies set by the President.
Hollande did not disagree with timeline set by Chirac and
German Chancellor Merkel for getting Europe back on its feet
in 2007-2008, noting the importance of the Franco-German
tandem and saying that, if the effort failed, it would take
another 4-5 years to come up with something new.

13. (C) Both Hollande and Moscovici made clear they that they
believed Chirac had no credibility for proposing anything now
to advance the European project, and both dismissed the idea
that the rejected constitution could be subjected to a second
referendum or, worse in their view, passed through
parliament. Holland and Moscovici agreed something new would
be required "to get Europe moving again," but they had
nothing specific to suggest. In the interim, Moscovici
suggested, it might be possible to use Croatian accession to
introduce a few institutional reforms that could be approved
by the parliaments of member states. Hollande dismissed
Sarkozy's ideas for having the six largest EU members states
play a leading role in setting policy, saying they were based
on outmoded ideas of "great powers" setting policy for
"little powers.".

FRANCE ) U.S. RELATIONS
-----------------------
14. (C) Hollande gave a slightly different version of the
argument we usually hear that, while the French at a large
disagree with the U.S. intervention in Iraq, Chirac and
Villepin should nonetheless not have confronted the U.S. so
openly. Hollande argued that Chirac erred by not making it
clear from the beginning how far he was prepared to go to
oppose the U.S. If Chirac had communicated more clearly how
strongly he felt about the matter, it would not have led to
the false impression that France might come along in the end.
Moscovici repeated his calls for dialogue aimed at
attempting to find agreement when the U.S. and France should
differ, adding that differences should be the exception and
not the rule. Hollande said he wanted a French foreign
policy more firmly rooted in universal values, such as
support for democracy, rather than the highly personalized
approach which characterized the Chirac years.

COMMENT
-------
15. (C) The are those among the PS's heavyweights, --
Strauss-Kahn, Fabius and their supporters -- who believe that
Hollande is subtly, successfully shaping developments so that
the PS candidate will wind up being either Royal or himself.
Commentators and party insiders refer to this pair of
possible outcomes as the "popularity" and "institutional"
options. In the case of the first, Royal successfully uses
her popularity with the public to impose herself on the party
as its candidate. If, however, Royal and her popularity
should for some reason falter, revealing a deeply splintered
party with no attractive candidates (the situation before her
emergence as the clear front-runner), then the
"institutional" option -- turning to the party leader to lead
the party in the election -- could become a viable one.
Please visit Paris' Classified Website at:
http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/eur/paris/index.c fm
STAPLETON

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