I second Schramm’s endorsement of the Bell review of de Villepin’s book. The image of the Frenchman that emerges is positively Nietzschean. As Bell puts it, "he worships at the altar of two holy things: French grandeur and political power, as incarnated in history’s ’great men.’" His heroes are not only Napoleon, but Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar and (of course) Charles de Gaulle, the first three of whom were also among Nietzsche’s heroes.

Another important passage: "There are many people who believed that de Villepin had valuable points to make in warning against a rush to war. If only we could believe that his argument against the war grew out of real conviction. His books suggest that in international affairs he is really an immoralist--that he has no trouble with a powerful nation imposing its will by force, taking potentially dangerous risks, and possibly violating international law. He just prefers that the nation in question be France."

By the way, I just noticed that in the lower right-hand corner of one of the pages of the review is an advertisement for Joseph S. Nye’s latest book, The Paradox of American Power: Why the World’s Only Superpower Can’t Go It Alone. Irony, anyone?