PARIS — French Armed Forces Minister Sébastien Lecornu will travel to Washington Thursday to meet with his U.S. counterpart Pete Hegseth, a French official told POLITICO.
The Middle East, Ukraine, the Indopacific region and NATO’s June summit are on the agenda, the official said.
The visit comes as the transatlantic relationship is increasingly strained thanks to U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade war, his undermining of NATO commitments, shift of support away from Ukraine and repeated demands for Europeans to spend 5 percent of their GDP on defense.
Earlier this week, U.S. Vice President JD Vance said Europe can’t be a “permanent security vassal” of the U.S., but singled out France among the few European nations he deems worthy militarily.
The French minister will also brief his U.S. counterpart about ongoing military planning on security guarantees for Ukraine led by France and the U.K.
Negotiations between the U.S. and Russia about the war in Ukraine are also on the menu. The two ministers will discuss NATO’s June summit in The Hague, where leaders are expected to raise the alliance’s defense spending target.
Lecornu will also meet Keith Kellogg, Trump’s special envoy for Ukraine, as well as Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence
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