The French leader is mulling sending troops to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, but his “little emperor” moment could turn into a nightmare for many
French President Emmanuel Macron is currently completely absorbed in cosplaying Napoleon, leading the charge to put French and European boots on the ground on Ukraine’s side against the Russians. His costume needs to be taken in for resizing – downward.
Sharing the stage with “Dollar General Napoleon” is British Prime Minister Keir Starmer in the role of “Wish Wellington.” This sweatshop mail order version of the legendary British Duke of Wellington and military strategist sounds like he was knocked around and damaged during the shipping process, and has been keen to use his predecessor’s Iraq War tagline of a “coalition of the willing” for marketing purposes. Because that worked out so great the first time that reminding people of it will surely make them want to have yet another go. This time against Russia.
“Wish Wellington” seems rather keen to repeat the logistic challenges of the actual Duke of Wellington in the Peninsular War of 1807 to 1814 in Spain and Portugal. Only this time the modern-day Napoleon knock-off would be fighting beside him rather than against him. Good luck stretching your logistics to Ukraine for battle when your stated opponent only has to travel from right next door.
Macron doesn’t want to go in right away though, he says. He needs for everyone to stop fighting for a bit first – a month to be precise – so the French and Brits and their posse can safely get to the VIP room with the bar service without having to worry about getting mixed up with guys throwing punches in Club Ukraine. Macron has since explained that the French wouldn’t be on the front line, but would be hanging out to guarantee “peace” – by repeating the same NATO troop presence that sparked the conflict’s escalation in the first place. So there’s no way they could possibly ever find themselves in the middle of punch-ups because Macron envisions that velvet rope separating his fantasy stage play from any real-life consequences remaining intact. A modern-day Maginot Line.
In the meantime, he’s been taking to TV to tell French citizens, “Who can believe today that Russia would stop at Ukraine?” Well, the French, for one – 65% of whom currently oppose French troops in Ukraine, according to a new CSA Institute poll. Guess they don’t really see it as the pressing issue that Macron portrays. Neither do other EU members, apparently – contrary to their own hyperventilation on the issue. Why else would they have held their Ukraine defense summit in London and not ensured that the Baltics were there, if they were really that concerned about the EU’s frontline countries.
Obviously this is about something else. And one of those other things is trying to literally scare up as much taxpayer cash by fear-bombing their electorate, using the “Russian threat,” to boost their own industrial base.
Germany’s economy has been in the dumps since 2022, but there’s nothing that now can’t be fixed with a trillion-euroblank check from the German taxpayer, as the top establishment parties on both the right and left now want – and a good excuse to have to transfer a big chunk of that cash to the country’s defense industry. Some analysts are saying that the plan could boost the country’s GDP by 2% – in the long run. And well, hey, even if it doesn’t, those responsible probably won’t be around when accountability comes knocking, anyway.
Meanwhile, France has been eyeing a defense spending boost for a while now – because nothing says sophisticated economic strategy like just cranking out piles of missiles. With French manufacturing about as sturdy as a baguette left out in the rain – declining output, sluggish new orders, and job cuts since 2023 – Reuters points to skyrocketing energy prices, fuel costs, and raw materials as the culprits. But hey, at least sticking it to Putin by messing with those things has totally, definitely worked… right? So who’s going to actually pay for all this? Sounds like the French government spokesperson already has an idea: dipping into the interest on French citizens’ savings. Pretty sure that people invest in savings so they can buy themselves nice things – not so Brigitte Macron’s former junior high school drama student can gear up for his “little emperor” era.
All this talk of war with Russia for peace has already sent European defense stocks through the roof. According to the Financial Times, Germany’s Rheinmetall is up 14%. A boost of 15% for France’s Thales and Italy’s Leonardo. BAE systems – 14%. Saab – 11%. Because nothing says ‘safety and security’ like a bunch of investors and establishment cronies getting rich off the backs of the average working stiff.
The whole charade also has the added bonus of accelerating Macron and European Commission President “Queen” Ursula von der Leyen’s shared fantasy of an integrated EU defense. “The Europe of defense, which we have been defending for eight years, is therefore becoming a reality,” Napoleclown said on March 5.
Not only can they now use Russia, but also Trump’s attempts to cooperate with Putin in securing peace, as a pretext for not having to share any defense cash with Trump’s America. Instead, they can now fully indulge in a shopping spree by themselves.
This is arguably a far bigger opportunity for the Western European military industrial complex than the earlier European collective defense project for which Macron and von der Leyen were ostensibly trying to leverage France’s military presence in Africa to achieve – until they were kicked out of countries when their stability missions resulted in several coups. Even afterwards, Macron was still arguing to Africa, while standing on Central African soil in 2023, that “our interest is to play collectively with our European allies and to position Europe as the partner of reference on major defense and security issues.” He added that “this is the very heart of what we are going to do beyond the pivot that I mentioned earlier,” referring to his grand new strategy of having French military bases in Africa self-identify as schools. Turns out that Africans just pivoted France and the EU right out of there, crushing the dreams of Macron and Queen Ursula, whose own troops reportedly resorted to using broomsticks instead of firearms for their training while she was busy mismanaging contracts as German defense minister – and which may or may not have also served as her chosen mode of transportation.
Ultimately, this whole European “war for peace” thing – “for Ukraine” – is just one big pantomime to fleece the locals, with Macron, Starmer, and von der Leyen hoping they won’t notice. Backstage, a shiny, integrated EU defense and industrial stimulus is being plotted, through a military-industrial shopping spree – which probably will take so long to actually emerge through all the usual red tape and squabbling that Ukraine risks fading well into the rear-view mirror in the meantime. For example, looking forward to someone in the cheap seats – who bought into the EU’s last big obsessive scam before this one – starts heckling them about how the tanks aren’t biodegradable.
Anyway, it seems like the only thing that could ruin their charade now is if some actual shooting inadvertently broke out because Russia isn’t just a non-playable character. Or, you know, World War III.
