Fact & Fiction

Kerry Got that de Gaulle Story Half-Right

by Aaron Erlich

Mr. Erlich is an HNN intern. He is pursuing a Masters degree at the BMW Center for German and European Studies, Georgetown University School of Foreign Service.

Note from the Editor: This article is based, in part, on information graciously provided by the H-Diplo historians who answered our request for fast help.

In the first presidential debate John Kerry argued that America has lost credibility in the eyes of its allies. In the context of a controversial call for a “global litmus test,” Kerry claimed that whereas now America would fail such a litmus test, in the past America would have passed.

To illustrate America’s past credibility, Kerry related an anecdote about the French president, Charles de Gaulle:

We can remember when President Kennedy in the Cuban missile crisis sent his secretary of state to Paris to meet with de Gaulle. And in the middle of the discussion, to tell them about the missiles in Cuba, he said, "Here, let me show you the photos." And de Gaulle waved them off and said, "No, no, no, no. The word of the president of the United States is good enough for me.

Though Kerry’s story contains a minor factual error (Kennedy sent Dean Acheson, the former Secretary of State), the rest of the statement is accurate according to several sources, most famously Jean Lacouture’s biography of de Gaulle.*

In his anecdote, however, Kerry failed to provide vital contextual information, which belies his use of the example to demonstrate American multilateralism. Before the photos were shown to him General de Gaulle stated: "I understand that you have not come to consult me, but to inform me." Upon being informed that this was indeed the case, De Gaulle then continued on to say that America was perfectly right in defending its interests, but if he had been consulted instead of informed he would have had to disagree with U.S. actions.

On the one hand, then, Kerry was correct in using the example of de Gaulle to assert that many nations did once put more faith in American intelligence gathering than they do at present, de Gaulle was not questioning the veracity of the U.S intelligence photographs, whereas in the case of Iraq, allies such as France have increasingly doubted American intelligence. On the other hand, Kerry’s comments vis-à-vis de Gaulle do not demonstrate American multilateralism. Rather they highlight the structural difference in the world system at the time—a structure in which the French more often quietly acquiesced in American decision making. In the case of the Cuban Missile Crisis, the U.S. was certainly not attempting to pass some global litmus test before acting.

*Jean LaCouture, Le Souverain (Editions de Seuil, Paris, 1989), pp. 364-365.