Macron reaffirms hypothesis of sending Western troops to fight Russians – War in Ukraine

French President Emmanuel Macron again admitted this Thursday the possibility of sending Western ground troops to Ukraine in the event that Russia “breaks through the front lines” and Kiev requests such support.

“If the Russians crossed the front line, if there was a Ukrainian request – which is not the case currently – we should legitimately ask ourselves the question”, said the French President in an interview with the British weekly The Economist.

For the French President, “to exclude him ‘a priori’ would mean not learning the lessons of the last two years”, when NATO countries initially ruled out sending tanks and planes to Ukraine, before changing their minds.

The French head of state caused controversy at the end of February when he stated that the deployment of Western troops to Ukraine should not “be excluded” in the future, explaining that his intention was to recover from the “strategic ambiguity” in Europe’s response to the Russian invasion from Ukraine.

However, most European countries, as well as the United States, have distanced themselves from his comments, although some have now taken a step in Macron’s direction.

“As I said, I don’t exclude anything, because we have someone in front of us who doesn’t exclude anything”, reaffirmed Emmanuel Macron, referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Western countries may be “too hesitant in formulating limits” in their response to the conflict in Ukraine, in the face of Putin, who has no limits and is the aggressor, for this reason, Macron has “a clear strategic objective: Russia will not can win in Ukraine”, added Macron, arguing that if that happens there will no longer be security in Europe.

“Who can pretend that Russia is going to stay here? What security will there be for the other neighboring countries, Moldova, Romania, Poland, Lithuania and many others? And what credibility would the Europeans have if they had spent billions, if had they said that the survival of the continent was at stake and had not provided themselves with the means to stop Russia? So, yes, we should not exclude anything”, he insisted.

In matters of defense, Europeans must sit “around the table to build a coherent framework”, argues Emmanuel Macron, adding that “NATO is one of those responses and it is not about putting NATO aside, but this framework it’s much broader,” he added.

In March, Emmanuel Macron reaffirmed that Western ground operations in Ukraine may be necessary “at some point”, in statements after a meeting with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk.

This statement by the French President triggered an increase in tension between Paris and Moscow, with military provocations and cyber attacks by Russian institutions.

At the same time, the Chief of Staff of the French Armed Forces, General Thierry Burkhard, argued that European support for Ukraine could be more than just supplying weapons, contradicting Russian expectations that Westerners “will never enter” the soil. Ukrainian.

The French Minister of the Armed Forces, Sébastien Lecornu, stated that he “does not want to take risks in supporting Ukraine” and, therefore, defended an acceleration in the production of weapons to equip the French military and export to other countries, in a transition towards a ” war economy”, defended by Macron.

At the end of April, the minister also defended the creation of a “European quick reaction force” with around 5,000 soldiers by 2025, which could intervene in crisis situations when NATO does not act.