Reading U.S. media opinion pieces, you’d think that French President Emmanuel Macron was the new Winston Churchill. A resolute defender of liberal order in the face of encroaching forces of authoritarianism.
There’s a trend here.
- From CNN, we learned that “Emmanuel Macron is auditioning to be leader of the free world.”
- From the Atlantic, we’re educated on how “Emmanuel Macron expounds as the world burns.”
- From the Hill, we’re asked, “Is Emmanuel Macron the one to restore the liberal world order?”
- From Politico, we read, “How Emmanuel Macron became the new leader of the free world.”
- From the Washington Post, we heard how “He’s leading the West.”
Macron has some positive domestic accomplishments, but I’m struck by how foreign policy elites are lionizing the young president. Their portrayal seems to begin and end with Macron’s support for global climate change action, and this appears to cover a multitude of sins. For again, and again, Macron appears to be in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s back pocket.
Macron proved it again last week when he spoke at the Munich Security Conference. As Russian state media happily pointed out, Macron issued yet another lament against European Union sanctions against the Kremlin.
“It is true that relations with Russia got worse in the last few years,” he said. “There were many reasons for it. Of course, we can talk about it extensively, but Russia shouldn’t be blocked or ignored.”
Macron continued, “Nowadays, there are many frozen conflicts, for example, in the cybersecurity field. And based on that, I think that sanctions didn’t bring good results. They were not effective. Europe has suffered because of the sanctions, the same as Russia. And the result is by no means positive.”
These comments blow a Titanic-sized hole in those aforementioned Macron-leader-of-the-world articles. For what Macron is doing here is to sideline the reality of Putin’s threat to the West in favor of France’s narrow national economic interests. French exports have suffered under EU sanctions, so Macron wants the sanctions gone. It’s that simple. And it is plainly incompatible with Macron’s claims to guardianship of the liberal order.
Those sanctions against Russia weren’t introduced on a whim. Russia had invaded Ukraine and seized vast areas of European territory, including the Crimean Peninsula. Once, the French condemned that aggression as intolerable and outrageous. But now, even as Russia kills Ukrainian soldiers, Macron is happy to pressure Ukraine into agreeing to a cease-fire favorable to Russia. The nationalist interest of supporting those French companies is what matters most, you see.
And it gets worse because the EU sanctions also fit into Putin’s ongoing effort to undermine the liberal international order. Recent examples include Putin’s spreading of exceptionally lethal nerve agents around English country towns, his downing of civilian airliners, his energy-blackmail policy, his annihilation of Syrian pediatric hospitals, and his support for Nicolas Maduro’s illegitimate regime, which is senselessly starving its population.
To be clear, Putin’s Russia is a keystone threat to everything Macron claims he holds dear. Yet, judging by his actions toward Moscow, Macron’s rhetoric isn’t just vacuous; it’s entirely dishonest.
Sadly, Macron applies a similar approach to his China policy. On the one hand, the president speaks of the need to defend human rights and a rules-based order. On the other, he bows to Beijing’s imperialism in return for its toxic investments.
Perhaps it’s time the media woke up to this.
