French President Emmanuel Macron’s “boots on the ground” comments last week are part of a strategy to push EU countries out of their comfort zone and start acting decisively for Ukraine, the French leader told reporters in Prague on Tuesday.

Last week, Macron made clear he no longer excluded the possibility of sending troops on the ground if required.

“We will do everything that we must so that Russia does not win,” he said at the time.

The comments were met with heavy backlash from a large majority of EU capitals, but Macron stood firm on Tuesday, during a press conference with Czech counterpart Petr Pavel in Prague, that his comments were “clear, unambiguous and precise”.

Asked during an informal exchange with reporters later that day whether EU member states needed to be roughened up a little to start acting on Ukraine appropriately, he confirmed it was “necessary”.

“If we’re passive and continue to do what we’ve been doing in the past two years, the risk we’re facing is to suffer setbacks on the ground and possible setbacks from the Americans,” the French president said.

Suggesting that nothing, including sending combat troops, should be out of the equation means “taking back the initiative” in hopes to “win this war, which is strategic for us”.

For months, France has been criticised for being the EU’s lame duck on all things Ukraine support and was accused of slowing down ammunition acquisition for Kyiv’s most pressing needs.

This shift in rhetoric comes as consensus grows Russia has become more dangerous than ever – both for Ukraine and the rest of the EU – and new action must be taken quickly.

“[Countries] face restrictions, including constitutional ones, exist […]. But it must not stop us from acting,” Emmanuel Macron added in a direct stab at Germany’s Olaf Scholz, who actively pushed back against the very hypothetical idea that troops could be sent on the ground in Ukraine and still refuses to deliver long-range Taurus missiles – wary Berlin could become “party to war”.

Earlier on Tuesday, Macron had called on EU member states to assert their own “strategic ambiguity” and keep quiet on next military steps to secure first-mover advantage.

(Theo Bourgery | Euractiv.fr)

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