In his book The American friend. Washington against De Gaullejournalist Éric Branca delivers a particularly enlightening anecdote on the relationships between the United States and Europe. The scene took place in June 1961. De Gaulle questions Kennedy:
“Suppose Khrushchev decides a blockade from Berlin. Are you going to reply through nuclear weapons?
– We have other responses, replies the American president.
De Gaulle insists:
– Suppose now that these other means are not enough to prevent the Soviets from taking Berlin and, later, Hamburg and, a few years later, Frankfurt. What will you decide, then?
After a long hesitation, Kennedy said to him:
-The plans will have to be improved to deal with this case … “
They won’t help us
Two years later, the American administration adopted the so -called McNamara doctrine of the “Graduated response”. The United States clearly indicates to its allies that in the event of a threat, they will not, to defend them, beyond tactical nuclear strikes. And Éric Branca to conclude: “Rather transforming Europe into a field of ruins than risking the destruction of New York or Philadelphia …” This reflection, among others, will lead the general to provide France with an independent deterrence which remains, faced with this world which is moving very quickly at the moment, one of the major assets of our country.
Donald Trump’s attitude towards Europe (and to Ukraine) is of course to be revisited by the relations between the United States and Russia, a Soviet formerly, Putinian today. Yesterday as today, the observation is the same: they will not help us, contrary to what the Atlantic current has been for decades. As the French president alerts “Existential threat” According to him, Russia, the United States has started by voting, in a historic flip-flop, with the Russians to the UN Security Council, a first resolution advocating a rapid end of the conflict, without mentioning the territorial integrity of Ukraine. Bilateral negotiations between Americans and Russians then opened in Riyadh, followed by others in Istanbul, in order to mark that in 2025, the peace treaties were no longer signed in Sèvres or Versailles, and that the axis of world diplomacy was singularly offset in the east.
First observation: if, unlike the time of de Gaulle and that of the Cold War, Russians and American meets around a table to quickly negotiate a peace, why Emmanuel Macron speaks by reminding the French that “The homeland needs you, your commitment. Political decisions, military equipment, budgets are one thing; But they will never replace the soul force of a nation ” ? These words, which a Charles Péguy would not have denied, would almost sound like a general mobilization. It has been a long time since the president had not heard about France in this way, with such gravity, above all, without adding Europe to all the sentences. The problem is that Emmanuel Macron intends to provoke a national start on the military thing, while he himself-who could forget the dismissal of the chief of the armies of the armies, Pierre de Villiers, victim of a “budgetary cup”? – And its predecessors have continued to reduce the format of our armies and to sell some of our strategic industries for forty years.
Reconstitute an army capable of facing the Russians will take ten years
Another point, if the threat was so pressed that that, as the Minister of Foreign Affairs Jean-Noël Barrot, reminds us that a front line that “Keeps getting closer to us”reconstructing an army capable of confronting the Russians will take in the low words ten years … We therefore act in a setback, not to say in panic. Emmanuel Macron stressed that he “Wants to believe that the United States will stay by our side”but also indicated that“We must be ready if that was not the case”. And there too, the shot is still.
How, could the allies repel Russia to provide Ukraine with lasting peace without the Americans, when they have not been able to do so for three years with them? Not to mention that if, with 132 billion euros in help from Ukraine in three years, Europe remains its main funder, far ahead of the United States at 115 billion, with regard to military aid, the Americans packed with $ 70 billion. To the point that with the best will in the world, in the event that the Americans will retire completely, the Europeans will find themselves unable to fill the vacuum left, even if the defense budgets of the member countries of the European Union went from 200 billion euros in 2021 to 320 billion euros in 2024. The Ukrainians, on their side, developed their own production of weapons and missiles, insufficient.
Washington prohibited the British, very at the forefront in the operational in the field, to deliver to the Ukrainians the information they themselves provide them
Our arsenals are empty
Since Wednesday, March 5, 2 p.m., by decision of Donald Trump, the United States has stopped sharing its information with the Ukrainians. Direct and immediate consequence: the Himar rocket launchers successfully used by kyiv to strike Russian strategic targets from the front are now unable to get more than sixty kilometers precisely. They are blind.
Worse, Washington prohibited the British, very at the forefront in the field operational, to deliver to the Ukrainians the information that themselves would provide them. This point is fundamental. He throws a shadow on the possible use of American equipment bought by European partners. However, this is considerable. Far from applying the “European preference” as regrets the representative of the Renew group to the European and faithful Parliament of Emmanuel Macron, Valérie Hayer, European countries buy 80 % of their military equipment outside the European Union, including 63 % in the United States.
Thus, nothing indicates that Americans are willing to accept in the future that these countries deliver this material to Ukraine. The American attitude, after the clash in the oval office, aims to force Ukraine to sit at the negotiating table. They don’t really have a choice. Thus, after having formulated apologies and having said he was ready to sign the agreement on minerals, Volodymyr Zelensky must go to Riyadh to Riyadh to meet on Monday to meet Crown Prince Mohammed Ben Salmane. Still in Saudi Arabia, the team of the Ukrainian president must meet their American counterparts the next day. A little earlier, Thursday, Donald Trump’s special envoy for the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, confirmed his arrival in Riyadh to speak with the Ukrainian emissaries about a cease-fire with Russia and “The way of making it sustainable”.
This situation shows, if necessary, the extreme fragility in which the Ukrainians find themselves. Faced with these prospects which could lead to the front of the front in the more or less long term, we have learned that, for the first time, French Mirage 2000 had been used to “Pushing Russian strikes” on the forehead. The promise to deliver these planes had been made by Emmanuel Macron to Ukraine on June 6, on the occasion of the 80th anniversary ceremonies. The hunters are controlled by Ukrainians who have undergone several months of training in France. But the performances of our mirage, which may be the most radiant brand of support in France in Ukraine, cannot hide the fact that our arsenals are empty.
