Emmanuel Macron’s provocative advocacy of European troops on the ground in Ukraine

Yesterday’s news analysis programs in Europe and in Russia devoted a lot of attention to French President Emmanuel Macron’s statements during a meeting at the Elysée Palace of a Conference in Support of Ukraine which was attended by a great many European heads of government or their immediate deputies and at a press conference which followed. Macron yet again has positioned himself and France at the vanguard of a new direction for European foreign and military policy, namely to send ground troops to Ukraine to participate in the war directly and thereby ensure Ukrainian victory and, what is more important, Russian defeat. Following Macron’s announcement, his prime minister spoke of the need to defeat Russia if Europe is to uphold the principle that democratic countries may not be swallowed up by totalitarian countries.

Macron’s proposal was immediately rejected by all major European leaders, including the hitherto most aggressive defenders of Ukraine among them, the United Kingdom, Poland and Germany. High-flying French ideological, geopolitical messaging ran into a brick wall of down-to-earth and justified imperatives of self-preservation among Macron’s peers, all of whom seem finally to take seriously Russian threats of immediate reprisals to those who move outside the fig leaf of proxy war and become de jure co-belligerents.

As I say, this tantalizing exposure of deep fissures in the positions of the West that contradict the myth of total solidarity among them was a red flag to global media.  Indeed, during the day I had two invitations to go on air and offer a comment. See below the link to my participation in a news program of India’s premier English language global broadcaster, WION:

On Russian television last night, Vladimir Solovyov opened his talk show with a lengthy  attack on Macron. Among the more printable remarks he made was that Macron is not a shadow of a rightful successor to General De Gaulle (to whom he likened himself in his speech to the U.S. Congress at the start of his first term in the presidency) but is rather a modern day Pétain (Nazi collaborationist) or Putain (whore).

Solovyov asked Macron rhetorically which French city does he wish to see burned to the ground first when the Russians respond to French entry into the war with their promised barrage of hypersonic missiles.  And he rounded out his commentary by noting that the French already have troops on the ground in Ukraine, namely members of their Foreign Legion in the guise of mercenaries, and that considerable numbers of them were among the dead when the Russians stormed Avdeevka a week ago.

©Gilbert Doctorow, 2024

Transcript below by a reader

Interviewer: 0:01
In the latest, Russia warns that conflict
between Russia and the US-led NATO
military alliance would become
inevitable if European members of NATO
troops fight in Ukraine. Kremlin
spokesperson has warned
that– and it comes amid statements made
by French president Emmanuel Macron in
Paris, where European leaders discussed
ways to bolster Western support for
Ukraine.

0:28
The French president said that
the prospect of sending NATO troops to
Ukraine should not be ruled out, despite
the NATO chief saying the alliance has
no such plans.

[On screen translation of Dmitry Peskov’s words in Russian:]
“In this case, we need to talk not about probability, but about inevitability. This is how I estimate it. And these countries should estimate it the same way and be aware of this. And ask themselves whether this in their interests, and most importantly, in the interests of the citizens of their countries.”

Interviewer: 0:58
Macron’s comments quickly
triggered a backlash. Western allies
immediately denounced the remarks on
putting soldiers in Ukraine. German
Chancellor Olaf Scholz said that leaders
in Paris said that everyone must do more
for Ukraine, but [not] by deploying NATO
forces.

Olaf Scholz [voice-over translation] 1:16
We obviously discussed ways how to
arrange for the support. And here once
again, in a very good debate it was
discussed that what was agreed from the
outset among ourselves and with each
other also applies to the future, namely
that there will be no ground troops. No
soldiers on Ukrainian soil will be sent
there by European countries or by NATO
states.

Interviewer: 1:42
The spokesperson for British
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak also said that
the UK had no plans for a large-scale
deployment in Ukraine. And a Spanish
government spokesperson also disagreed
on deploying European troops. On the
other hand, even talks of a confrontation
between Russia and NATO indicates the
dangers of escalation. Russia and the
United States, who are the biggest powers
behind NATO, have the world’s largest
nuclear arsenal. It has made President Joe
Biden repeatedly cautious that a conflict
between Russia and NATO could trigger
World War III.

2:18
Meanwhile, as the war
escalates, Ukrainian forces on Tuesday
said that quote-unquote “Fierce battles”
were underway near the key towns of Chasiv
Yar in eastern Ukraine, where Russia is
actively trying to advance. Chasiv Yar is
located near Bakhmut, which fell to Russian
forces in May last year. A Russian
advance in that area would ramp up the
pressure on Kramatorsk, which is the last
major city in the Donbas region and
still controlled by Ukraine, which is
coming under increasing frequent
bombardment.

Interviewer: 3:03
To discuss this further, we are rejoined
by Dr Gilbert Doctorow. He is an
international affairs analyst, author and
historian. He’s joining us live from
Brussels. Sir, thank you so much for
joining us here on WION. I want to ask
you a question; the straight question is
that how probable do you think it is for
the West to send troops to Ukraine?

Doctorow: 3:24
I think that Mr
Macron was trying to draw attention to
himself. This he’s been doing for the
whole time of his presidency. He finds
it necessary to remind the world that
France is an important country and that
he is an important leader. But
unfortunately, the man is extremely
shallow, and the positions that he has
taken, the flip-flops he’s taken– from
extending an olive branch to Russia
when everyone else was against it, to now
trying to instigate the
sending of troops officially to
engage in the war against Russia– these
are shallow and badly thought-out
statements only for the sake of his own
vanity.

4:12
The idea of sending troops to the war
is, of course, denounced by
all the other European leaders–

Interviewer:
Right.

Doctorow:
–who took part in this meeting, and for good
reason, because they know that the Russians’
statement of their intentions to respond
with military force to any NATO country that
attacks them or that facilitates the dispatch
of F-16s or long-range missiles to Ukraine or
under the name of Ukraine, to be used
against Russia, is risking a direct hit
by Russian missiles.

Interviewer: 4:50
Absolutely, Dr Gilbert. That’s exactly what I was
going to speak about. But you see,
you’re calling Emmanuel Macron shallow,
but when Emmanuel Macron goes on the global
stage, makes a statement like that, it’s
not just that he’s only representing
France, is he. He’s representing the
entirety of NATO. And after that, we see
Germany, Britain and Spain say that they
have no plans to send ground troops.

I want to ask you: How does that make NATO
look in the eyes of the entire world, as
well as in front of Russia?

Doctorow: 5:21
It makes NATO look reasonably
afraid of Russia, which it should be,
because in terms of military might, NATO
is, even with American participation, inferior
in force in conventional weapons to what
the Russians have, and they understand
that, finally. in the West.

5:38
Of course,
there’s a disparity. It’s most amazing
that Poland is among those countries
that stated at the very beginning of Mr Macron’s …
time on the stage, that
they will not participate, because Poland
has been among the most …
aggressive in opposing Russian policy
generally, and Russian policy in Ukraine
in particular.

Interviewer:
Right.

Doctorow:
Britain also is an outstanding case. The
Britains, the Brits have been the
attack dog for the United States in the
whole Ukrainian saga. And
the Prime Minister’s spokesman said at
once that they will not send ground
troops.

Interviewer: 6:16
Dr Gilbert, I want to take your
quick reaction on something that we are
just getting. US President Joe Biden
has warned the Congress leaders of quote
-unquote “dire cost” in case the Ukraine–
in case they fail, to cause the
Ukraine failure and the– what
we have been hearing in the Congress,
the failure in the aid that Ukraine
is expecting but has still not gotten to pass.
I want to ask you: what could we
see, the repercussions of it, on the
ground?

Doctorow: 6:46
None. This is completely empty
rhetoric by Mr Biden. He’s reading
lines that have been fed to him by
people like Victoria Nuland and other hawks.
The reality is that it’s too late to save
Ukraine. And even if they were to
vote tomorrow to put in the 60 billion,
it will be only to provide additional
funds to the American defense industry,
not to send one useful piece of war
materiel to Ukraine. The game is up, and
most congressmen, or many Congressmen,
appreciate that fact and are not playing
along.

Interviewer:
All right.

Doctorow:
So the Ukrainian situation is
ripe for resolution.

Interviewer:
Dr Gilbert, thank
you so much for giving us all those
insights and very interesting points
there. Thank you so much for joining us
here on WION. Always a pleasure
speaking to you.

Doctorow: 7:30
Thanks for the invitation.

Translation below into German (Andreas Mylaeus)

Emmanuel Macrons provokatives Eintreten für europäische Truppen vor Ort in der Ukraine

Die gestrigen Nachrichtensendungen in Europa und Russland widmeten den Äußerungen des französischen Präsidenten Emmanuel Macron bei einer Konferenz zur Unterstützung der Ukraine im Elysée-Palast, an der zahlreiche europäische Regierungschefs oder ihre unmittelbaren Stellvertreter teilnahmen, und bei einer anschließenden Pressekonferenz große Aufmerksamkeit. Macron hat sich und Frankreich erneut an die Spitze einer neuen Richtung der europäischen Außen- und Militärpolitik gestellt, nämlich Bodentruppen in die Ukraine zu entsenden, um sich direkt am Krieg zu beteiligen und so den ukrainischen Sieg und – was noch wichtiger ist – die russische Niederlage sicherzustellen. Nach Macrons Ankündigung sprach sein Premierminister von der Notwendigkeit, Russland zu besiegen, wenn Europa den Grundsatz aufrechterhalten will, dass demokratische Länder nicht von totalitären Ländern geschluckt werden dürfen.

Macrons Vorschlag wurde sofort von allen wichtigen europäischen Staats- und Regierungschefs abgelehnt, darunter auch von den bisher aggressivsten Verteidigern der Ukraine, nämlich dem Vereinigten Königreich, Polen und Deutschland. Die hochfliegenden ideologischen und geopolitischen Botschaften Frankreichs trafen bei Macrons Amtskollegen auf eine Mauer aus bodenständigen und gerechtfertigten Selbsterhaltungszwängen, die alle endlich die russischen Drohungen mit sofortigen Repressalien gegen diejenigen ernst zu nehmen scheinen, die das Feigenblatt des Stellvertreterkriegs verlassen und de jure zu Mitstreitern werden.

Wie gesagt, diese quälende Aufdeckung tiefer Risse in den Positionen des Westens, die dem Mythos der totalen Solidarität zwischen ihnen widersprechen, war eine rote Fahne für die globalen Medien. Im Laufe des Tages erhielt ich zwei Einladungen, auf Sendung zu gehen und einen Kommentar abzugeben. Unten finden Sie den Link zu meiner Teilnahme an einer Nachrichtensendung von WION, Indiens wichtigstem englischsprachigen globalen Sender.

Im russischen Fernsehen eröffnete Wladimir Solowjow gestern Abend seine Talkshow mit einem langen Angriff auf Macron. Zu den druckreifen Bemerkungen gehörte, dass Macron nicht der Schatten eines rechtmäßigen Nachfolgers von General de Gaulle sei (mit dem er sich in seiner Rede vor dem US-Kongress zu Beginn seiner ersten Amtszeit als Präsident verglich), sondern eher ein moderner Pétain (Nazi-Kollaborateur) oder Putain (Hure).

Solowjow fragte Macron rhetorisch, welche französische Stadt er zuerst niedergebrannt sehen möchte, wenn die Russen auf den französischen Kriegseintritt mit dem versprochenen Sperrfeuer von Hyperschallraketen reagieren. Und er rundete seinen Kommentar ab, indem er darauf hinwies, dass die Franzosen bereits Truppen vor Ort in der Ukraine haben, nämlich Mitglieder ihrer Fremdenlegion in Form von Söldnern, und dass eine beträchtliche Anzahl von ihnen unter den Toten war, als die Russen vor einer Woche Avdejevka gestürmt haben.