2024-02-27 10:26:27
French President Emmanuel Macron does not rule out the use of ground troops in Ukraine by his country. Nothing can be ruled out to prevent a Russian victory in Ukraine, Macron said following concluding a Ukraine aid conference with more than 20 heads of state and government, including Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD), in Paris on Monday evening.
“There is no consensus today regarding officially sending ground troops,” said Macron. “But nothing can be ruled out in the dynamic. We will do whatever it takes to ensure that Russia cannot win this war.” Many people who said “never, never” today are the same people who said two years ago, “never, never tanks, never, never airplanes, never, ever longer range missiles.” Today the discussion is regarding becoming faster and stronger in the delivery of tanks and missiles. “So anything is possible if it is helpful to achieve our goal,” the French president said.
Read the analysis from our France correspondent Martina Meister here
“The general conclusion today is that the security of all of us is at stake,” Macron said at the start of the conference, which was organized at short notice. Russia’s stance is hardening both at the political level and on the front in Ukraine, where new Russian attacks are threatened. A Russian defeat is necessary for stability and security in Europe. That’s why Ukraine’s supporters need to get a move on. “We are in the process of ensuring our security today and tomorrow,” Macron said. “We don’t want to go to war with the Russian people,” the president also said.
The populist Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico had previously stated that individual Western countries would consider sending their soldiers to Ukraine. “I didn’t say that France wasn’t open to it,” Macron said. Rather, he is committed to “strategic ambiguity”.
At the meeting it was decided to form a coalition that would provide Ukraine with medium and long-range missiles and bombs for strikes far behind Russian lines, the French president said. In the short term, additional ammunition should also be mobilized for Ukraine from our own stocks and from third countries. There is currently no decision to deliver French Mirage fighter jets.
However, he did not mention which countries should participate in what form. Before the conference began, Chancellor Scholz had reiterated his negative stance on the deployment of long-range Taurus cruise missiles.
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At the conference it was also decided to provide more aid to Ukraine more quickly, said Macron. France also supports considerations of using common debt to finance European defense spending in view of the war in Ukraine. Similar to the Corona crisis, all European countries are affected by Russia’s aggression, which justifies the special route of shared debt. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who joined the conference at short notice with a video message, had called for further help so that Russia does not expand its aggression to other countries.
Opposition in Germany for Macron’s statement
After French President Emmanuel Macron, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal also did not rule out sending ground troops to Ukraine. Macron reminded that “you cannot rule out anything in a war that is once once more taking place in the heart of Europe and at the gates of the European Union,” Attal said on Tuesday on radio station RTL.
Green Party leader Omid Nouripour However, declared on Tuesday that the deployment of Western ground troops in Ukraine was not up for debate. “It’s not an issue at all. It is not an issue in the discussion in Germany or in an alliance,” said Nouripour on ntv. Regarding statements made by the French President, he said: “I experienced a humorous Macron who simply wanted to say: I don’t want to rule anything out.”
His party colleague Agnieszka Brugger, deputy chairwoman of the Green parliamentary group, criticized Macron’s statements. In doing so, France is crossing a line that Germany, but also other countries such as the USA, have clearly drawn, she said on Deutschlandfunk. Macron’s words distracted from other important things that had been jointly decided to support Ukraine. These included the delivery of additional weapons and the imposition of new sanctions once morest Russia. The focus should be on these areas, continued Brugger. France might also contribute more here.
Also the parliamentary managing director of the Union parliamentary group, Thorsten Frei (CDU), reacted negatively to Macron’s statements. Western ground troops in Ukraine are not up for debate, Frei said on rbb Inforadio. However, further arms aid for Ukraine is crucial in order to defend itself once morest Russia.
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Lower Saxony’s SPD Prime Minister Stephan Weil said on NDR that he was strictly once morest a corresponding mandate for the Bundeswehr. Criticism also came from the CDU, the Greens, the AfD and the Left Party. FDP defense expert Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann said Germany does not have to share Macron’s assessment; However, she praised the president as a “driver”, while Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) was a “slower”. Prime Minister Weil does not assume that these considerations will be followed by actions. Instead, the West must continue to help Ukraine with arms deliveries. “That’s what matters most to them,” said the SPD politician.
The SPD foreign expert Michael Roth called the possible deployment of Western ground troops “a phantom debate.” “I don’t know anyone who seriously wants this, not even in Ukraine,” Roth wrote on X, formerly Twitter. “Above all, they need ammunition, air defense, drones, long-range weapons.”
The FDP politician Strack-Zimmermann said Germany did not have to share Macron’s assessment, but nevertheless praised the French president’s determination. Putin’s warning once morest direct Western interference in the war did not arrive in Paris, but “arrived with a double whammy in the Chancellery,” Strack-Zimmermann told the Funke newspapers.
The AfD member of the Bundestag Matthias Moosdorf called the “talk regarding sending troops to Ukraine” a “playing with fire.” “We call on the federal government to finally advocate for gradual relaxation through diplomatic initiatives,” the AfD parliamentary group quoted Moosdorf as saying on X.
Sharp criticism came from the Left Party. “Macron can obviously no longer be saved. If a NATO state or even several NATO states send ground troops to Ukraine, we will have World War III. “That is completely out of the question,” warned Gregor Gysi, foreign policy spokesman for the Left group in the Bundestag. The left-wing politician Dietmar Bartsch called “Macron’s pomposity” a “dangerous madness that would set Europe on fire.”
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