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Macron enters into open war with France’s armed forces chief

French President Emmanuel Macron is in a very open conflict with the chief of the French armed forces, who may be forced to resign in what would be an unprecedented crisis.

Published: 17 July 2017 11:57 CEST
Macron enters into open war with France’s armed forces chief
Macron waving and Pierre de Villiers looing stern. Photo: AFP

Macron has shown he is not afraid to enter into battle but he probably wasn't expecting that within a couple of months of him becoming head of state he would be at war with his own armed forces chief.

The conflict began last week when France’s budget minister Gerald Darmanin revealed details of how the French government will make spending cuts in order to get the country’s finances under control.

No ministry would be spared, not even the ministry of defence which would have to cope with making savings of €850 million, mainly on the cost of equipment.

The following day on July 12th, the furious chief of the French armed forces General Pierre de Villiers protested the cuts before the president’s council of defence and the parliament’s own defence commission.

The irate De Villiers, known for talking frankly, apparently used the phrase “I won’t let you fuck me like that” (Je ne me laisserai pas baiser comme ça).

While MPs may have applauded his stance, President Macron was clearly irked.

On the evening of July 13th, with US President Donald Trump in town, Macron paid a visit to the Ministry of Defence for the traditional homage to soldiers before the July 14th military parade.

“It is not dignified to hold certain debates in the public arena,” Macron told those present with  de Villiers clearly in mind.

Then in an authoritarian tone he told the military chiefs assembled at the ministry: “I am your boss”.

Telling them he will stick to his commitments to make cuts he said: “I don’t need pressure or commentary”.

At that point it looked like the general wouldn’t even accompany Macron for the traditional July 14th parade along the Champs-Elysées.

But in the end he took up his place alongside the president in their military vehicle, albeit with a face of thunder.

Two days later on July 16th the president rammed his message home.

In an interview with Journal du Dimanche Macron said: “If the [Armed Forces] chief of staff has an issue with the President of the Republique, then it is the chief of defence staff who will change his position.”

But De Villiers may jump first. He suggested in a Facebook post this week that he will make a decision this week.

If he were to resign in protest it would be an unprecedented move and provoke a major crisis for the French president.

But even if he were to stay it appears that Macron is heading for troubled waters, given that France's armed forces are involved in military operations in Mali, Iraq and Syria.

“Armies basically obey. So in substance the president was within his rights to restate his authority,” a former chief of the French armed forces Henri Bentégeat told Le Monde newspaper.

“But the way he did it will leave marks. You cannot publicly question a military leader like that in front of his subordinates,” said Bentégeat, who said that the head of the armed forces was “just doing his duty” by defending the budget for the military.

“When Macron attends the first ceremony for a soldier killed because of a lack of equipment, all the criticism will be directed at him,” said Bentégeant.

NATO

Erdogan links Swedish Nato approval to Turkish EU membership

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Monday he would back Sweden's Nato candidacy if the European Union resumes long-stalled membership talks with Ankara.

Published: 10 July 2023 12:35 CEST
Erdogan links Swedish Nato approval to Turkish EU membership

“First, open the way to Turkey’s membership of the European Union, and then we will open it for Sweden, just as we had opened it for Finland,” Erdogan told a televised media appearance, before departing for the NATO summit in Lithuania.

Erdogan said “this is what I told” US President Joe Biden when the two leaders spoke by phone on Sunday.

Turkey first applied to be a member of the European Economic Community — a predecessor to the EU — in 1987. It became an EU candidate country in 1999 and formally launched membership negotiations with the bloc in 2005.

The talks stalled in 2016 over European concerns about Turkish human rights violations.

“I would like to underline one reality. Turkey has been waiting at the EU’s front door for 50 years,” Erdogan said. “Almost all the NATO members are EU members. I now am addressing these countries, which are making Turkey wait for more than 50 years, and I will address them again in Vilnius.”

Sweden’s prime minister, Ulf Kristersson, is due to meet Erdogan at 5pm on Monday in a last ditch attempt to win approval for the country’s Nato bid ahead of Nato’s summit in Vilnius on July 11th and 12th. 

Turkey has previously explained its refusal to back Swedish membership as motivated by the country’s harbouring of people connected to the PKK, a Kurdish terrorist group, and the Gülen movement, who Erdogan blames for an attempted coup in 2016. 

More recently, he has criticised Sweden’s willingness to allow pro-Kurdish groups to protest in Swedish cities and allow anti-Islamic protesters to burn copies of the Quran, the holy book of Islam.

In a sign of the likely reaction of counties which are members both of Nato and the EU, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said that the two issues should not be connected. 

“Sweden meets all the requirements for Nato membership,” Scholz told reporters in Berlin. “The other question is one that is not connected with it and that is why I do not think it should be seen as a connected issue.”

Malena Britz, Associate Professor in Political Science at the Swedish Defence University, told public broadcaster SVT that Erdogan’s new gambit will have caught Sweden’s negotiators, the EU, and even Nato Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg off guard. 

“I think both the member states and Stoltenberg had expected this to be about Nato and not about what the EU is getting up to,” she said. “That’s not something Nato even has any control over. If Erdogan sticks to the idea that Turkey isn’t going to let Sweden into Nato until Turkey’s EU membership talks start again, then Sweden and Nato will need to think about another solution.” 

Aras Lindh, a Turkey expert at the Swedish Institute of Foreign Affairs, agreed that the move had taken Nato by surprise. 

“This came suddenly. I find it hard to believe that anything like this will become reality, although there could possibly be some sort of joint statement from the EU countries. I don’t think that any of the EU countries which are also Nato members were prepared for this issue.”

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