This article was originally published by The Canberra Times.
June 6, 2014 - 70 years on from D-Day.
"Go on then," said Andrew Probyn in his familiar patois.
I was peering through an unauthorised side entrance to the magnificent Gothic Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Bayeux in north-western France - a door left ajar to accommodate heavy broadcast cables snaking off in both directions.
There were just two spaces in the cathedral reserved for the travelling press gallery contingent and we had secured them.
So, in we bowled and as we glanced along its vast pews, it seemed we'd jagged the same row as the big-wigs such as Charles and Camilla, French President Francois Hollande, Britain's David Cameron, New Zealand's John Key, and Australia's Tony Abbott.
We'd queued for no metal detector, been spoken to harshly by no official, surrendered our press credentials to no name-checker.
It was similar story at ceremony's end as we blithely ignored a request to remain seated, and mingled along with the official party as we all emerged blinking into the sparkling Normandy morning.
That 2014 visit to France with Abbott was like that. Goodwill and trust running deep.
Trailing the Australian PM on the roped-off walk up from the cathedral to the Bayeux War Cemetery, thousands of locals lined the streets to applaud, waving French and Australians flags and shouting messages of love and gratitude.
This is the largest resting place of Commonwealth soldiers in France with 4648 graves alongside the Bayeux Memorial which commemorates another 1800 Commonwealth soldiers killed in Normandy but given no grave site.
On the same trip Abbott also visited Villiers-Bretonneux - site of some of the bloodiest fighting from the previous war.
The primary school there displays a huge sign above the play/lunch area which reads "Do Not Forget Australia" and granite plaques in both languages set into the main building's walls bring tears to southern eyes:
"This school building is the gift of the school children of Victoria, Australia, to the children of Villers-Bretonneux as proof of their love and goodwill towards France. Twelve-hundred Australian soldiers, the fathers and brothers of these children, gave their lives in the heroic recapture of this town, from the invader on the 24th of April 1918, and are buried near this spot. May the memory of great sacrifices in a common cause keep France and Australia together forever in bonds of friendship and mutual esteem".
The French-Australian relationship is indeed an extraordinary bond, founded in principles like liberty and democracy, enriched by mutual adoration and signed in blood.
So it was a big thing on Sunday evening in Rome, when France's current President, Emmanuel Macron, called Australia's Prime Minister a liar. Macron is emerging as the senior-most figure in Europe, and the continent's most measured and centrist leader.
Scott Morrison has achieved a rare double, simultaneously shredding his own nation's reputation and humiliating one of its staunchest friends. All for a single, selfishly-timed picture opportunity with Joe Biden and Boris Johnson.
In fact, let's call it a trifecta because in then refusing even to apologise for what Biden euphemistically labelled "clumsy", Morrison implied Biden was ill-informed and exacerbated the Franco-Australian nadir. And for what national gain?
Consider Macron's words carefully. "I have a lot of respect for your country, a lot of respect and friendship for your people. I just say when we have respect, you have to be true and you have to behave in line and consistent with this value."
"I do respect sovereign choices, but you have to respect alliances and partners and it was not the case with this (AUKUS) deal".
Australian elections rarely turn on foreign policy questions or diplomatic faux pas.
But 2022 might be different.
Morrison, "the accidental prime minister", is building a reputation as a cack-handed diplomat having gratuitously harmed bilateral relations with our biggest trading partner in China and now one of our oldest friends, in France.
The China failings have been well-ventilated. Australia has every right to pursue its national interest and to repel Chinese interference - spying and economic coercion.
And Morrison was not wrong to want an inquiry into the origins of SARS-CoV-2, but the maximum humiliation method of promoting it was also likely to maximise its costs - measurable in Beijing's ire, and diminished chances of success.
Having his foreign minister belch out the inquiry demand on Insiders one morning for want of another "announcable", simply handed Beijing the off switch.
Morrison also was within his rights to decide the French submarine contract was too slow, too expensive, and too limited in its capability potential.
And it must be said, some level of French umbrage was inevitable, no matter how that backtrack was communicated. But summarily dropping the $80 billion contract in favour of no contract at all belied the claimed urgency used to justify the reversal.
A judicious path - which by-the-way, carried the not inconsiderable benefits of logic, transparency and honour - would have been to dissolve the current contract in favour of a fresh tender call for nuclear-powered vessels for which the French and presumably the Brits and Americans could compete.
But this, like the woefully conceived captain's call during the 2018 Wentworth byelection to move Australia's embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, had nothing to do with honour or integrity, nor policy rigour.
It was short-term, shallowly political, and divisive.
It is well known Morrison was not popular with colleagues when he was chosen in 2018.
He has more friends now (PMs always do) but these friendships may prove no deeper than his loyalty to Australia's friends.
Some Liberals concede Australia's most transactional prime minister is more shopfront than warehouse, a leader not invested in the policy complexities of the job.
They recognise the emerging danger for the Coalition as it approaches E-day in 2022, is the pattern of his behaviour, the word games, the un-Christian refusal to admit wrong, the overweening self-regard, is becoming obvious to voters, too.
Even those who take no interest in the particulars of foreign affairs.
- Mark Kenny is a professor at the ANU Australian Studies Institute and host of the Democracy Sausage podcast.