When G7 leaders can't even agree on a communique, we have a problem

Communique.

It's the French word for an official announcement.

Communiques are usually polite, highlighting points of agreement after global leaders meet.

So it was the absence of any such statement after the G7 meeting in France that was the biggest statement of all.

"It really is a huge setback," said Adam Triggs from the Australian National University.

"The state of global cooperation is just so low at the moment that they can't even agree on these most basic documents.

"They can't even agree on some of these most high-level principles, like 'trade is good' in particular."

Why does it matter, you might ask?

The Group of Seven advanced economies we are talking about here is made up of the United Kingdom, Canada, Japan, Germany, France, Italy and the United States (spoiler alert — it was at the centre of this).

Prime Minister Scott Morrison was there, too (as a guest), and these nations are some of Australia's closest security partners.

If traditionally like-minded allies cannot even agree on a form of words about the world, then we have a problem.

The $34 million 'thrifty summit'

Before the gathering, French President Emmanuel Macron said trying to secure such a document would be "pointless" amid rows with the US over climate change, trade and Iran.

He wanted to avoid the meeting morphing into a circus and wanted to avert a rerun of last year when US President Donald Trump disavowed the joint statement via a Tweet.

Oh, and let's not forget last year's APEC meeting in Papua New Guinea, which ended communique-free after a clash between (you guessed it) the US and China over trade.

Luckily, the get-together at the idyllic seaside town of Biarritz only cost 21 million euros ($34 million), and that included Michelin-starred cuisine and fine French wine.

"It's a thrifty summit," Mr Macron boasted.

As the summit wrapped, it looked like the main result was the offer of $US20 million ($US30 million) to help Brazil fight fires in the Amazon. But even that was quickly rejected by Brazil's President.

Trump's China and Iran breakthroughs likely to break down

Another outcome was Mr Trump suggesting he could meet with Iran's leader Hassan Rouhani to end a confrontation over the country's 2015 nuclear deal.

The American leader also predicted a trade deal with China — just days after Washington and Beijing slapped tit-for-tat import duties on billions of dollars worth of products.

But Dr Triggs said "we've seen this before" when it comes to Mr Trump and tariffs.

"There'll always be some discussion that there is a deal coming ... and then it eventually goes away," said Dr Triggs, who previously worked on the G20 summit for Australia's Prime Minister's Department.

Trade expert Stephen Kirchner from the United States Studies Centre at Sydney University agreed the so-called breakthrough would likely just break down.

"It's not an outcome of the summit per se ... it was a little bit tangential to the summit itself," he said.

"But I think it's very much part of a cycle where Trump hits people with tariffs, other countries retaliate, [and] this gives rise to a trade war.

"There's an effort to resolve the differences, but those talks then basically fail, and we get another round of tariffs.

"This is a cycle that we've seen on the periphery of the last two G7 meetings and the last G20 meeting."

But Dr Kirchner did not mind Biarritz being declared a no-communique zone and a brief one-page list of issues discussed instead being released.

These global meetings are held on a regular basis, he said, often forcing leaders to meet before issues are resolved.

Sure, some previous gatherings similarly achieved little by way of tangible outcomes.

But other G7 meetings brought the world together on vital issues, including promises to clear the debts of impoverished nations and to help after the Chernobyl nuclear catastrophe.

Success this time? The avoidance of any diplomatic disasters.