Macron: I Should Have Listened to Eastern Europe Regarding Reality of Russian Threat

French President Emmanuel Macron speaks the Globsec regional security forum in Bratislava,
LUDOVIC MARIN/AFP via Getty Images
Peter Caddle

French President Emmanuel Macron has admitted that he should have previously listened to Eastern Europe regarding the threat Russia posed.

Speaking at a security conference in Slovakia on Wednesday, French President Emmanuel Macron appeared to admit that he failed to take warnings about Vladimir Putin’s Russia seriously before the Ukraine war.

Macron was one of the last Western politicians to recognise the threat posed by Russia before its invasion of Ukraine in 2022, with the French head-of-state even once saying that he had received assurances from Putin that now military escalation with the Kyiv would occur just weeks before the invasion.

According to a report by France24, Macron admitted that he, along with others in the West, missed their chance to heed the warnings of those in the East.

“We did not always listen to your voice enough… Some said you had missed an opportunity to stay silent,” Macron remarked, referencing a historic statement by former French President Jacques Chirac with which he criticised parts of Eastern Europe for supporting the invasion of Iraq.

“I think we also lost an opportunity to listen to you,” he added, assuring the gathered crowd that he and other Western powers are no longer ignoring Eastern Europe now.

Macron also rolled-back comments he had made back in 2019 deriding NATO as having experienced a “brain death”, telling the security conference that he now viewed the organisation as a very real asset.

“I had a harsh word for NATO in December 2019,” he said. “I can say that today Vladimir Putin jolted it awake with the worst of electric shocks.”

The declaration will likely be music to the ears of the Biden Administration, which is working hard to see the military alliance further expanded in Europe at the expense of Moscow and its dwindling allies.

To this end, the Democratic government is even working to woo Turkey’s Islamist Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, hinting that his country will be permitted to purchase $20 billion worth of F-16s should it agree to allow Sweden to join NATO.

Though denying suggestions of any quid pro quo deal, officials within the U.S. government have hinted that American lawmakers would look very favourably on Turkey should it drop its objection to the Scandinavian nation joining, with Erdoğan opposition partly being the result of Quran-burning protests in the country.

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