On Friday, French President Emmanuel Macron said France was working to “finalize a coalition” of NATO countries that are willing to send troops to Ukraine to train Ukrainian forces, a step that would mark a huge escalation in the proxy war.
During a press conference with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Paris, Macron said Ukraine’s request for NATO trainers was “legitimate” and downplayed the risk of escalation.
“It’s much more efficient and practical for certain capacities in certain conditions to train on Ukrainian soil, it’s a legitimate request,” Macron said. “We’re going to use the coming days to finalize the broadest possible coalition.” He added that several NATO countries have already agreed to the plan.
Moscow has said that any French trainers deployed to Ukraine would be legitimate targets of the Russian military, but Macron dismissed the warning. “This is not deploying … European soldiers on the front line. It is recognizing the sovereignty of Ukraine over its territory,” he said. “Who would we be to give in to the invocations or threats of Russia?”
Reuters reported on May 30 that France planned to initially send a few dozen troops to asses the training mission before sending hundreds of soldiers. The talk of sending French troops to Ukraine has highlighted the fact that there are already a small number of NATO special operations soldiers inside Ukraine (97 as of March 2023), but a larger public deployment will take NATO involvement in the war to another level.
The advancement of France’s plans to send troops to Ukraine comes after the US gave Ukraine the greenlight to strike Russian territory with US-provided missiles, which also risks a major response from Russia. So far, the Biden administration has said it has no plans to send trainers to Ukraine, but it has taken escalatory steps that it’s previously ruled out throughout the conflict.
FJB and Macroni
The lunatics have truly overtaken the asylum.
And when the first French troops are wiped out how long do you think it will be before the event is rebranded as 'an attack on NATO'? I give Washington about 1.2 seconds, tops, before the hysterical shrieking begins.
Agree – it's just the kind of idiotic, backwards "logic" the US is so fond of saying out loud with a straight face. "They did exactly what they warned they would, attacking our troops in someone else's war zone – and that's an unprovoked attack against America and NATO !"
And this is going to help with Ukraine's lack of manpower how? Is it really the "training", or lack thereof, that is making the difference between being victorious against a country with 3 times the population? Unless NATO sends a massive number of troops and gets directly involved, this won't do shit.
It's supposedly freeing up the Ukie trainers so they can be sent to the front … but they don't Want to be sent to the front!
The real reason is Ukraine knows that if it sends its draftees to Western Europe for training like it did in 2023, very few will return.
Good point … hadn't thought of that.
Go ahead and send them, you pretend Napoleon … send them to the meat grinder and see what happens. A couple of smart glide bombs to the training site would take care of this contribution.
God how France has fallen … to see this banker errand boy take the chair of De Gaulle, Mitterrand, and Chirac is pretty incredible.
Interesting discussion on System Update last night about leadership in Europe and neolibs losing support.
So, he's going to suit up and go there himself? Suits me. Put him into one of the front trenches.
How did it work the last time France went to war with Russia?
Spetsnaz (Russian: Спецназ) will hunt down and eliminate each and every French troop and send them to Paris in body bags.
Which will go over real well in France.
Russia is not going to send spetznaz they r going to kill them all with massive strikes with hypersonic missiles.if macron wants to use them as tripwire for greater escalation he will get his wish. The frencies r going to die
Surprise! Macron may be out of office soon. Elections have consequences.
I would be genuinely surprised if Russia doesn't kill them all with massive strikes.
I didn't see the invasion coming but I really thought something serious was about to happen when I read putins's speech to the military saying we have nowhere else to go but this I can see it coming if macron sends troops in western Ukraine Russia will kill them
Moscow has said that any French trainers deployed to Ukraine would be legitimate targets of the Russian military, but Macron dismissed the warning. “This is not deploying … European soldiers on the front line. It is recognizing the sovereignty of Ukraine over its territory,” he said. “Who would we be to give in to the invocations or threats of Russia?
I mean, why wouldn't the "trainers" be legitimate targets (even assuming that training is all that the French soldiers do)? Active military training camps are, of course, legal targets in war, and that includes the trainers as well as the trainees, and the entire facility. Macron can "dismiss" whatever he likes, but the reality is that those French trainers, operating in the Ukraine, will be in harms way. If some of them are killed or wounded, what does Macron intend to do about it? Send more trainers? Say it's "unfair?" Cover it up? Escalate further?
That’s exactly what he intends to do. Remember in the past when Moscow claimed French troops were killed and the west denied it up and down?
'French mercenaries' killed in Ukraine: Paris calls out a Russian disinformation operation
On Wednesday, January 17, Moscow claimed to have killed around 60 foreign fighters operating on French payroll in a strike on a building in Kharkiv, eastern Ukraine.
https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2024/01/26/french-mercenaries-killed-in-ukraine-paris-calls-out-a-russian-disinformation-operation_6466963_4.html#
Deny it? How can Macron do that, when he has publically announced their presence? Deniablity is the idea behind the “special forces” and “intelligence agents” fiction. The West clearly already has some military personnel on the ground in the Ukraine. But they are not “boots on the ground,” they are “spooks on the ground,” and when spooks die, the government and military are explicitly allowed to deny and even lie about where they were, what they were doing, how they died, etc. But “regular” troops? When Corporal Pierre from Lyon is posted to a training camp in western Ukraine, with full fanfare and public announcement, and then gets blown up by a Russian missile, what are Macron and the French military brass going to say? “No, he didn’t?”
Pick a lie, any lie.
LOL!
well, at least the idiots are leaving for moscow before the first snows this time….