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Secretary Cohen:During our meetings this morning we focused on four areas of our relationship: operations to maintain and expand peace and stability; Africa; cooperation in space; and efforts to control proliferation.
................The increased use of satellites is central to modern military operations. France has proposed that we work together to clarify ways that our militaries can cooperate in space.
......................Minister Richard:
On the main topics we have been covering this morning, I think it's important to notice the important level, sometimes underestimated, of our military relations. We are purchasing some U.S. aircraft, Hawkeyes, for instance, for our sea surveillance. We are testing Rafale in the Navy version with the support of American technical support. We have a U-2 based in a French base, in a French airport to achieve some missions. And we have quite a lot of liaison officers in all our mutual organizations.
...................I agree with what Bill said about space cooperation. We want to build on the '93 agreement. We agree with our American friends that we must have a consistent procedure of finding practical cooperations on science and technology in space, and that we must define together the objectives we want to achieve from a military point of view.
Last, on proliferation. This is an area of close consultation and cooperation. I think we have specific responsibilities together as permanent members of the Security Council and as nuclear powers we are reaching some intelligence, some levels of information on proliferation trends, and it's very important for us to work closely to try and counteract, to be contrary to our proliferation attempts that we can witness now.
.................Q: I wanted to ask the Minister a question. Actually, sir, I wanted to go back to something in your opening statement. You mentioned increasing military space cooperation and I was curious about the kind of programs or objectives you might have. Are you looking at sharing of military space intelligence with the U.S.? Are you looking at developing joint intelligence satellites? Reconnaissance, imaging? What are your thoughts?
A: (Richard): Basically, you know, in space activities you have either communication or intelligence, so if we want to work on this sector of technology, we have in mind sharing more and building more cooperation on those two aspects. This is an opportunity for me to remind you that this country has had a consistent and permanent effort to modernize its armed forces on quite a series of technologies, and we have finished a review of our defense expenditure effort last month, actually. There was an agreement between the present majority and the President to go on with the program, the long term program of acquisition and procurement. And I think we can be a significant partner in an allied effort to improve our capacities in space.
Q: Secretary Cohen, do you foresee perhaps developing or operating intelligence satellites jointly with the French under this kind of plan?
A: (Cohen): Well, there are a number of areas of cooperation. The Minister mentioned navigation, communication, intelligence. These are all areas that we are going to explore and hope to come up with some concrete proposals by the end of this year. We're basically trying to come to some understanding of where we could in fact cooperate on a joint basis, and what areas we could work together on. But they're all open to at least discussion, and we hope to conclude those discussions and examinations by the end of the year with some concrete proposals.