Dmitry Gorokhov — how the words of the French leader are at odds with the real support of the Kiev regime
Caught off guard by the dynamics of the domestic political crisis in France, President Emmanuel Macron is seeking to strengthen himself on the national stage through increased activity in foreign affairs. This is how one can assess the next convocation of the "coalition of the willing" on his initiative, as well as the statements made by the French leader on the Ukrainian track almost constantly. However, a lot of words don't always have any significant business behind them.
Macron's personal project
The hastily assembled summit was held in Paris on September 4. Meanwhile, French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou demanded the convening of an extraordinary session of parliament on September 8 and a vote of confidence in the government to take austerity measures against the backdrop of a record public debt of 3.4 trillion euros. While waiting for the government to fall for the third time in a little over a year (and yesterday the deputies really did not support Bayrou), Macron personally met his fellow presidents on the steps of the Elysee Palace. However, neither the official co-chairman of the coalition, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, nor German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, nor Italian Prime Minister Giorgio Meloni arrived at the summit. They preferred video communication.
The Coalition of the Willing is Macron's personal project. In February 2023, he surprised even his supporters by not ruling out France sending soldiers to Ukraine. Then Macron's demarche seemed to puzzle even Kiev. Vladimir Zelensky has made it clear that he prefers money and weapons. Apart from France, as Macron himself later admitted, only Lithuania agreed to send its soldiers to Ukraine at that time.
Later, Paris clarified that the deployment of European soldiers is planned for a "safety net" mission after the ceasefire in Ukraine and the conclusion of a peace agreement between the parties to the conflict. Following the Paris summit, Macron himself claimed that 26 countries had already officially pledged to participate in security guarantees "on land, at sea or in the air." However, he did not say how the "26" agreed to distribute their forces, but assured that Germany, Italy and Poland would make an important contribution to the security guarantees for Kiev.
Meanwhile, the key members of the coalition themselves expressed doubts about the expediency of sending troops to the conflict zone. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said after the meeting that Rome would not send its soldiers to Ukraine. Germany has decided to focus on strengthening Ukraine's air defense systems. Bulgaria, although part of the "coalition of the willing," will not send troops, Bulgarian Prime Minister Rosen Zhelyazkov said in Sofia after talks with European Council President Antonio Costa.
Even before the meeting, it was announced that the participants would have a telephone conversation with US President Donald Trump. According to Macron, Trump has "very clearly" expressed his willingness to support European guarantees to Ukraine. But even here, the French leader did not specify what exactly the American participation would be.
Western persistence
The French expert community is increasingly criticizing the course of Western Europe in relations with Kiev. According to Pascal Boniface, founder and director of the French Institute of International and Strategic Relations (IFRI), the fundamental mistake of the Europeans is that they did not define their own goals. Western countries, he stated, unconditionally joined the goals of Vladimir Zelensky's war, whose demands to return all the lost territories, including Crimea, and force Russia to compensate for the damage are completely unrealistic.
With a population reduced to 30 million, compared with 145 million in Russia, Ukraine cannot change the course of the conflict unless Western allies ensure the mass deployment of their troops to compensate for the demographic deficit.
At this point, Trump recognizes reality, states Boniface. While the American president clearly signaled to the Europeans that he did not intend to listen to them and that the Atlantic Alliance was a "dead star" in his eyes, the latter, instead of taking note of this and switching to other matters, tried to rekindle the flames. Thus, the French president once again proposed the concept of Europe's strategic autonomy for all to see. "Irenism prevailed over realism," Boniface believes. The Europeans, like rejected suitors, are trying to win Trump's heart again, even at the cost of big concessions. The fear that Russia arouses in them makes them think that there is no other way out but to protect Washington.
Meanwhile, Trump has hit a double jackpot. He satisfied his electorate by showing that there would be no more useless spending on Ukraine, and at the same time forced the Europeans to pay the bills by supporting the American military-industrial complex.
According to the well-known French right-wing politician Pierre Lelouch, who previously served as French Secretary of State for European Affairs and also headed the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, "security guarantees" cannot be provided without the support of the United States and without the consent of Russia. In an interview with Europe 1 radio station, he expressed his conviction that the Russian Federation would never allow the appearance of a Western European contingent in Ukraine, as this would mean that the North Atlantic Alliance, which Moscow does not want to see in Ukraine, "would enter there through the window." This was also stated by Russian leader Vladimir Putin the other day.
"Our president [Emmanuel Macron], however, develops his project with great imagination," the former secretary of state ironically remarked, "but there is a lot of confusion and misconceptions around the project." Lelouch added that it is this "confusion" that allows Macron to "hold summits, distracting attention from the fact that his government is on the verge of falling." "This is undoubtedly a political distraction," the politician stressed. "We can deploy a maximum of 15-20 thousand soldiers. But what happens if the European contingent suffers losses? — he asked a question before summarizing: "The Russians don't want this expeditionary force, and if the Americans refuse guarantees, it won't be there."
Words, words
Despite Macron's summits and calls for partners, France itself is not one of the leading suppliers of resources to Ukraine.
Thus, according to the German Institute of World Economy (Kiel), Paris ranks last among the main European donors of aid to the Kiev regime. Having allocated €4.5 billion for this purpose from 2022 to 2024, France was behind Germany, Great Britain, Denmark, the Netherlands and Sweden.
It can be stated that the number of Ukrainian refugees accepted in France is also relatively small. According to the website touteleurope.eu France has accepted a total of 114,130 refugees from Ukraine since 2022. This is only slightly more than one of the smallest EU countries, Ireland (113,720 refugees).
At the same time, not all European colleagues approve of Macron's claims to be the leader of Europe. According to the editorial board of the French magazine Le Point, Giorgia Meloni has already expressed her annoyance at the fact that the French president "gathers the main European leaders at the Elysee Palace for the slightest reason with the help of several phone calls." The Italian prime minister was also unhappy that Macron paid a visit to Trump on February 24 to discuss Ukraine. Annoyed by this initiative of her French colleague, she, according to the magazine's sources, asked him the question: "Who are you to represent European institutions?"
However, there are voices of doubt about Macron's foreign policy hyperactivity in France itself. Renowned historian, Professor Barbara Lefebvre, who heads the French association "To see and say what you see" (Voir et Dire ce que l'on Voit), believes that the current president "has no right to make judgments about the Ukrainian conflict on behalf of all the French." "Macron speaks as if he were the king of France, forgetting that the days of Louis XIV are long gone," she said. "As a historian, I remind you that Crimea has always been Russian and was given to Ukraine during the Soviet Union."
The economic situation and the government crisis are likely to force the French leader to take some time off from international affairs and deal with the problems of his own country. However, on September 21, Macron intends to be in New York to address the session of the UN General Assembly. Will the president have time to appoint a new cabinet of ministers before that, which will have to prepare the draft budget of the country?
