Furious France Scraps Gala to Commemorate Paris Help In U.S. Battle

The United States acknowledged on Thursday that it only gave France a few hours' notice of its deal to provide Australia with nuclear-powered submarines, a move that French officials have denounced as a major betrayal by one of its closest allies and Paris promptly canceled the gala commemorating the “240th Anniversary of the Battle of the Capes,” celebrating the French navy’s help in a 1781 battle during America’s fight for independence.

Photo Insert: The Battle of the Capes

France had been trying to strike its own, multibillion-dollar deal with Australia, and French officials said that the new agreement, which US President Joe Biden announced at the White House on Wednesday with the leaders of Australia and Britain joining virtually, was an affront, Michael D. Shear and Roger Cohen reported for the New York Times.

President Biden’s national security adviser informed France on Wednesday morning that the US had reached the deal with Australia, revealing the plan to the top French diplomat in Washington on the same day that Mr. Biden made it public, a senior US official said Thursday.

The person asked for anonymity to talk about diplomatic discussions. The degree of French anger recalled the acrimony between Paris and Washington in 2003 over the Iraq war and involved language not seen since then.

“This is not done between allies,” Jean-Yves Le Drian, the foreign minister, said in an interview with Franceinfo radio, calling the deal a “unilateral, brutal, unpredictable decision.”

French officials described the exclusion of France, a NATO member, from the new British-Australian-US military partnership as a moment that will deepen an already widening rift between longstanding allies.

President Emmanuel Macron has already said he intends to pursue French “strategic autonomy” from the US.

But even as American officials scrambled to respond to the French anger, they dismissed the notion of a serious rift. Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, told reporters that the US informed the French before the president’s announcement but did not have an obligation to include the country in their arrangement with Australia and Britain.

“This is not the only global engagement or global cooperative partnership the United States has in the world,” she said. She added that the United States and France will continue to be partners in a number of other ways, noting that “the French are a member of the G-7.”

Still, the lack of consultation — and the last-minute revelation — has infuriated French officials in Washington, who on Thursday angrily canceled a gala at their Washington embassy to protest what they called a rash and sudden policy decision that resembled those of former President Donald J. Trump.

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