Last week, French President Emmanuel Macron went to China to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping. This was the first visit of France’s president since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, and it follows the visit German Chancellor Olaf Scholz made to China in early March. That visit caused much discontent in Europe, as Scholz seemed to be breaking from the West’s ranks in the war against Russia in order to pursue the commercial interests of Germany.
For this reason, Emmanuel Macron was accompanied by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, to show that he was trying to advance the interests of the entire EU and not solely those of France. In particular, they reportedly asked Xi to “bring Russia back to reason.” Nevertheless, Macron was accompanied by plenty of French business leaders on his trip to Beijing – and subsequently to Guangzhou – who were in search for contracts to be signed. Additionally, it seemed that the French President and the EU Commission President released quite diverging messages regarding the purpose of their trip.
While von der Leyen has tried to portray a sense of unity in the European front, including that of its alliance with the US and other NATO countries, Macron has shocked policy observers and allies with the declarations he made after his tea with Xi Jinping. These declarations by Macron contained the following three messages.
First, that the EU needs to build the “strategic autonomy” that the French President has spoken about since his first months in office in 2017. Second, that this strategic autonomy will serve the purpose of not making European countries vassal states of the US. And third, that the EU should as a result not be embroiled in all the geo-strategic disputes of the US that are not pertinent to the EU’s own objectives.
All this is happening while the US is trying to build a united front against China in what we have called Cold War 2. We assume that these declarations won’t make the US president particularly happy, as they clearly undermine his own efforts.
Especially as they are coming at a time when China is flexing its muscles against its “rebel province” of Taiwan. This week China started a military exercise against Taiwan, reportedly with live ammunition, in response to which the US has sent a military ship. We have discussed several times how we think that China will try to destabilise Taiwan with a series of provocations that will eventually aim at overthrowing the fragile democracy of the island, following a tactic not too dissimilar to that which it used to regain control of Hong Kong.
French President Macron has tried to revive the dream of Europe’s strategic autonomy. But in this polarising world, in which countries have to side either with China or the US, this may prove much harder than he currently predicts.
