Macron’s Rhetoric About Europe’s Strategic Autonomy Is A Direct Outcome Of His Trip To China

It's important to point out the timing of his latest words, which were shared after he just met with President Xi for around six hours according to Politico’s report. The Chinese leader clearly believed that his French counterpart is sincere with his intentions otherwise he wouldn’t have set aside so much of his valuable time when remembering how busy he is dealing with so many other issues across the world.

Politico published an exclusive piece on Sunday reporting on their journalists’ conversation with French President Macron during his visit to China, at which time he spoke enthusiastically about his goal of making Europe a strategically autonomous player in International Relations. As proof of his intentions, he lambasted the notion that it should follow the US’ lead in provoking China over Taiwan, which prompted sharp condemnation from many American-aligned commentators across the continent.

They accounted for this stance by suggesting that President Xi successfully wined and dined him during his trip to Beijing, thus dividing-and-ruling the French leader and European Commissioner Von Der Leyen, the latter of whom is known to be a pro-US hawk and poised to potentially lead NATO. As for the Alt-Media Community’s (AMC) reaction to Macron’s latest rhetoric, they predictably dismissed it since they’re convinced that his visit served no practical purpose and was nothing but theater.

In reality, “Macron & Von Der Leyen’s Trip To China Served A Very Pragmatic Purpose”. Those two were exploring what would have to happen for China to cross the EU’s “red line” by arming Russia, while China wanted to know whether they’d cross its own “red line” by sanctioning it if that happened. The French leader seems sincerely concerned about the scenario of the US pressuring the EU to “decouple” from China in that event, while Von Der Leyen probably wants that to unfold to advance the US’ aims.

About those, it has an interest in further strengthening its successfully reasserted hegemony over Europe at the expense of the latter’s strategic autonomy in order to turn its “sphere of influence” over the Golden Billion into a single pole amidst the impending trifurcation of International Relations. US strategists believe that this is the only way that their country can retain as many of unipolarity’s trappings as possible in the face of the Sino-Russo Entente’s joint efforts to midwife multipolarity.

Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC) Director-General Andrey Kortunov explained at length late last year in his piece about “A New Western Cohesion and World Order” that the US has a pretty high chance of at least partially succeeding in this respect, which should be read in full by all AMC skeptics. It’ll therefore be very challenging for Macron to make good on his goal of turning Europe into a strategically autonomous player in International Relations.  

Nevertheless, there’s no denying the powerful symbolism of his latest words, which contradict the US’ demands of its European vassals to always follow its lead in the New Cold War out of “solidarity” with “fellow democracies” in the face of the “authoritarian threats” supposedly posed by China and Russia. This reinforces the observation that Macron is sincere about what he said even if he’s deliberately or delusionally denying just how difficult it’ll be for the EU to meaningfully defy the US on anything.

It's also important to point out the timing of his latest words, which were shared after he just met with President Xi for around six hours according to Politico’s report. The Chinese leader clearly believed that his French counterpart is sincere with his intentions otherwise he wouldn’t have set aside so much of his valuable time when remembering how busy he is dealing with so many other issues across the world. This suggests that President Xi isn’t taking the EU’s US-pressured “decoupling” from China for granted.

It's one thing for the bloc to “decouple” from Russia under US pressure and another entirely to do the same when it comes to China, which is its top trade partner. It would be mutually disadvantageous if that happens, but the EU would suffer far worse than the People’s Republic due to the former’s much more precarious economic-financial stability at the moment. With this in mind, Macron wanted to make it known that France would at least try to resist any such US plot if China arms Russia.

All things considered, while it might ultimately be unrealistic to expect France to successfully defy the US on this issue, it’s dishonest to downplay the symbolic importance of Macron’s latest rhetoric. In the event that Kiev’s upcoming counteroffensive falters and thus doesn’t push China into feeling compelled to arm Russia as a last resort for preemptively ensuring its own national security, there’s a chance that Presidents Xi and Macron might jointly try to broker a ceasefire in the NATO-Russian proxy war.

Both of their countries’ interests would be served by de-escalating that conflict: China’s with respect to positioning itself as a diplomatic superpower and France’s when it comes to flexing Europe’s envisaged strategic autonomy. Furthermore, they’d also be able to avert the worst-case scenario of their US-pressured “decoupling” that Washington could seek to impose on Brussels by exploiting the pretext of responding to China’s potential arming of Russia that could occur in the conditions described above.

There are a lot of variables beyond either of their control that could offset the aforementioned best-case scenario, but observers shouldn’t let themselves be misled by the Mainstream Media’s latest innuendo that Macron “sold out” to China or the AMC’s claiming that he’s a fraud. The French leader’s latest words are sincere, especially those symbolically significant ones about intending to resist US pressure over Taiwan, thus proving that his six hours’ worth of time with President Xi were fruitful.