PARIS — President Emmanuel Macron has warned that France needs to prepare for the possibility of the United States disengaging from Europe by increasing spending on defense needs and rethinking how the country uses its nuclear deterrent.
“The Russian threat is here and is affecting European countries, affecting us,” Macron said in a nationally televised speech on Wednesday. “I want to believe that the U.S. will stay by our side, but we have to be ready if they don’t.”
Macron warned that the relative peace Western Europe has enjoyed on its soil since the end of World War II appears to be at an end, and that the continent must prepare for the future by beefing up its own defenses.
“Our generation will no longer reap the dividends of peace. It is up to us to ensure that our children reap the dividends of our commitments tomorrow,” he added.
The French leader spoke on the eve of a crisis summit in Brussels on Thursday, in which the European Union’s 27 leaders will discuss how to boost defense spending and support Ukraine in the wake of Washington’s repeated signals it is pivoting away from Europe and adopting a more conciliatory approach to Russia in the hope of striking a peace deal.
Washington paused military aid to Kyiv and has stopped intelligence sharing with Ukraine following last week’s disastrous meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Macron made it clear that he still believes Ukraine cannot be abandoned on the road to peace, nor should Europe accept a ceasefire without sufficient security guarantees. He added that he would meet with military officials from those countries willing to send peacekeeping forces — who would only be deployed once the fighting stops — to enforce a future ceasefire in Ukraine in the coming days.
Macron also accused Moscow of “testing [France’s] limits” both on the military and cyber front,” and doubled down on his claim that Russia had turned the war in Ukraine into a “global conflict.”
To face that threat without the United States, Macron said he had decided to open a strategic debate on expanding France’s nuclear deterrent to protect the country’s European allies — something incoming German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has also advocated.
Merz and Macron are traveling to Brussels on Thursday to discuss, among other things, a bold proposal from European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to unlock up to €800 billion over the next few years for defense. Von der Leyen’s plan includes a scheme to set up some €150 billion in loans to buy artillery, missiles, ammunition, drones and anti-drone systems. It also includes a proposal to loosen the bloc’s stringent fiscal rules to allow already-indebted member states to spend more on defense.
European diplomats have called the plan a step in the right direction, while the French president views it “very favorably,” according to an Elysée official.
At home, Macron wants France to increase defense spending to more than 3 percent of its gross domestic product. He said on Wednesday that those new investments should not involve additional taxation, although Economy Minister Eric Lombard recently floated taxing the rich as a way of raising money for defense expenditures.
Whatever ends up happening, Macron has little room to act on issues related to spending and taxation as he is not backed by a majority in parliament.
Laura Kayali contributed to this report.
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