This text presents an assessment of France's policies towards NATO between 1981 and 1997. It also provides a critical assessment of these policies. It argues that France's arms length relationship with NATO's integrated military structure served its purpose during the Cold War, but increasingly came to impose high costs thereafter. The author goes on to explain this somewhat puzzling fidelity to inappropriate policies as a function of domestic pressures on French policy makers.

This book presents the first in-depth assessment of France's policies towards NATO between 1981 and 1997. It also provides a critical assessment of these policies. It argues that France's arms-length relationship with NATO's integrated military structure served its purpose during the Cold War, but increasingly came to impose high costs thereafter.