CONFIDENTIAL
III
a)
Practical Circumstances and Objectives
The Present Environment
Note several features of environment which may be
propitious for British aims and should be exploited.
Eg:
improvement in both French and German attitudes to
Britain as a "European", since resolution of the
Budget problem (and in light of our positive
attitude and improved tactics in other European
fora such as WEU);
developments in France: i) Mitterrand's wish to
make Franco-German axis less cloying and
exclusive, ii) general more
cooperative/Atlanticist trend in French policy
(which should reduce areas of basic Anglo-French
disagreement);
Germany's need for friends:
continuing
weakness/incoherence of FRG Community policy,
vulnerability over Deutschland politik/
"revanchism" issue, risk of losing ground in
East-West dialogue; and recent prominence of
defence/security issues which brings Britain's
contribution into clearer focus (but also
highlights need to maintain it!);
nature of the European agenda for the next
few years.
High proportion of issues which:
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