July 3, 2008 (LPAC)--The conflict between French army and the Presidency is now fully out in the open. In an act of rage after a shooting incident during an army show in southern France, Nicolas Sarkozy refused to salute army officers, telling Army Chief of Staff Gen. Bruno Cuche, "You are not professionals, but amateurs." Gen. Cuche, who was to retire in August, immediately resigned.

Cuche, who was part of the military opposing Sarkozy on sending more troops to Afghanistan, is known to have warned the President of the pauperization of the army last January. Two weeks ago, a group of officers anonymously contested the Army's reform (which will shut down bases and cut 20% of the military) in an op-ed published in national press, and hundreds of officers refused at the same time to sing the national anthem after Sarkozy's reform speech. The soon-to-come integration of the French army into NATO's integrated command is also a shift of policy from Gen. De Gaulle's doctrine of national independence and is not well received among the military.

Now, several military officers are furious about this "open disregard for the army." One anonymously told journalists, "One cannot called the guys, who will be fighting in Afghanistan next month and risking their lives for France, amateurs"; another said, "the whole army supports Cuche"; and a third, "there is distrust between the Presidency and the army, and it's worsening."

Sarkozy just took this semester's rotating presidency of the EU on July 1st, and one of his main objectives is to build up a 60,000-troop intervention corps for out-of-Europe deployment, as a "European pillar for NATO."