M Chirac opened the latest front in France’s cultural war on Wednesday, when he ordered the Culture Ministry and the National Library to counter Google Print, a project by the leading — American — search engine which will make 15 million books in English available on the internet.

As with Gallic resistance to Hollywood and “Anglo-Saxon” pop music, the French are alarmed that Google Print may brainwash the world with its English-language views. American culture “tends to erase the other cultures”, M Chirac said last year. The Google scheme, will draw on respected academic and public libraries but could lead to the ultimate French nightmare: the world learning French history from English-language books.

Jean-Noël Jeanneney, the director of the French National Library, who is heading M Chirac’s project, sketched this vision last month.

M Jeanneney said the “heavily biased” British and American version of the French Revolution would be all about “valiant British aristocrats triumphing over bloodthirsty Jacobins and the guillotine blotting out the rights of man”.

“The challenge is immense,” he said. “Here we have the risk of America reinforcing its crushing domination of future generations’ understanding of the world.”

M Chirac is expected to propose his Europe-wide virtual library when he holds a summit in Paris today with Gerhard Schröder, the German Chancellor, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, the Prime Minister of Spain, and Vladimir Putin, the Russian President.

M Chirac is due to accompany Mr Putin on a visit to the Paris book fair, which opens today with Russian literature as this year’s theme.

The Elysée Palace said that the French leader was keen to bring Britain and the British Library into his European scheme, which would take about five years to launch.

It said that Paris might consider working with Google but wanted to start from a position of strength.

Paris was not trying to pick a fight with the Americans or combat the “omnigooglisation” of the world, Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres, the Culture Minister, said. “We just want everyone to be able to exert the influence of their own talents, heritage, history and culture.”

As usual with France’s schemes for ensuring le rayonnement de la culture Française, the taxpayer will cover much of the cost. Google’s plan is costing an initial £100 million.

Paris is still awaiting a verdict from the EU Commission on its previous attempt to bestow Gallic influence on the world: M Chirac’s French-language news channel, designed to counter the global power of the US Cable News Network — CNN — and BBC World.

The Brussels competition watchdog must approve the heavy state subsidy for the channel, which is to be operated jointly by TF1, the biggest commercial network, and France Television, the state network, at a cost of £50 million a year.

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