We are October 12, in the village hall of the Elysée. Emmanuel Macron has just handed over the insignia of Commander of the Legion of Honor to his former mentor, Jean-Pierre Chevènementthe only political personality that the young president followed in a party, at the end of the 1990s, the one for which he voted on April 21, 2002. A figure who marked fifty years of national political life, one of the leaders of the old anti-Atlanticist left, but also a convinced Russophile, decorated in 2017 with the Order of Friendship by Vladimir Putin, as France’s “special representative” for Russia.
That day, therefore, before an assembly of politicians and ambassadors, Emmanuel Macron unearthed various anecdotes about his transition to the Citizens’ Movement. It also exalts that free spirit which, from “Belfort in Moscow”has raised the values of the Republic to the highest level and ensures that those for whom Chevènement “love Russia a little too much (…) misunderstand [les] meanders » of man. Beyond the personal tribute, would this chevénementist matrix be one of the keys to understanding the puzzling diplomacy of Emmanuel Macron since the start of the conflict initiated by Russia in Ukraine, almost ten months ago?
His diplomatic “at the same time” is a mystery. He troubles the diplomats at the Quai d’Orsay and disconcerts his European and American partners. War is back in Europe, and the French president’s obstinacy in talking to his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, as well as to Vladimir Putin is robbing some of the continent’s capitals, notably Warsaw, Tallin, Riga, Vilnius, Helsinki and Stockholm. At regular intervals, Emmanuel Macron undermines the close relations built with Mr. Zelensky, giving cold sweats to the Ukrainian diplomats responsible, in Paris, for dispelling each new misunderstanding.
On February 7, 2022, even before the outbreak of the Russian offensive and with US intelligence forecasting an imminent attack, Mr. Macron surprised his world by traveling to Moscow for a desperate attempt at mediation. Offense: he prefers not to pass until the next day only by Ukraine, where his visit was nevertheless hoped for a long time. In the flight between Moscow and Kiev, he details the commitments that Mr. Putin would have made in front of him the day before: not to attack Ukraine, to withdraw the troops stationed in Belarus for what the Kremlin still presents as “exercises”…
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