A lot of people thought France was just being arrogant for not going all in on becoming dependent on the US and maintaining their own ways of doing things. These past few years, it's been paying off for them. Hopefully other countries will wisen up and not allow their defense and entire economy to be dependent on the US or any other big country. It always comes back to bite them in the ass. The post WW2 decades were unusually stable and assuming it'll be that way forever is not wise.

You can't do everything, and the smaller your country the less you can do. France isn't doing other things because of the opportunity cost.

Of course the EU is bigger than the US and there is value in duplicated/distributed effort. The EU as a whole should be thinking "partner with everyone, but have our fingers in every single pot someplace just in case".