The Franco-German treaty signed by Macron and Merkel in Aachen on Tuesday 22 January will have the opposite effect to that intended, as it will affect the relations between the two peoples.
This treaty, prepared secretly and without public discussion, became known only a few days before it was signed. It is concluded between two Heads of State or Government with a serious lack of legitimacy: Emmanuel Macron is involved in the Yellow West crisis, and Angela Merkel has reached the end of her office term and is only concerned with day-to-day business. A sad caricature of the Elysée Treaty signed on 22 January 1963 between Charles de Gaulle and Konrad Adenauer, which ended a century of hostilities between the two countries.
The Franco-German partnership was very balanced in the spirit of its renowned signatories. This is no longer the case. The euro, as it is handled, is the main cause: it stimulates German industry and causes the slow death of French industry. Trade, including agricultural trade, is showing an increasing surplus for Germany and a deficit for France. As if there was an concerted plan to weaken French power, control over our industrial flagships - products of national engineering such as Alstom, Nexter, soon perhaps Naval Group and others - is being transferred across the Rhine or elsewhere under the pretext of cooperation. Airbus, the result of the efforts of generations of French engineers, is now beyond any French control.
The treaty implies the project of a future merger of the two nations into a single state: one parliament, one state budget, one army. This also includes French support for Germany’s demand for a permanent seat on the Security Council. Even if this has no prospect of success, this support will appear to the whole world as a sign of devotion. By leaning on Mrs Merkel, Macron hopes to drag the other countries in a final leap towards supranational integration. Exactly the opposite will happen: This treaty does not seem to be in line with the Lisbon Treaty, as it makes enhanced cooperation between individual member states subject to the other states’ consent (Article 21), which will only create resentment against our two countries.
The projeted integration, which runs counter to history, which everywhere sees a return to the sovereignty of nations, does neither directly nor indirectly meet the will of our two peoples. Peoples, like individuals, do not like promiscuity. Two neighbours who get along well will quickly hate each other if certain boundaries that separate them are torn off. The Franco-German reconciliation seemed to have been achieved. By forcing us to share the same bed, Macron and Merkel are challenging it.
The treaty gives the question of language only a subordinate place: both the Germans and the French practice the language of the other less and less. Macron himself has never bothered to learn a little German. The result is a mutual ignorance, as a Germanomaniac French oligarchy is demonstrating, who wants to imitate everything that comes from the other side of the Rhine, but has no idea what is happening there.
Our German friends should not be deceived: The apparent Germanophilia of the so-called French elites is less a sign of interest in genuine Germany than of their pathological contempt for the French people. The French, with whom their government negotiates in secret, are not the French people. They do not represent the people. They should beware of the effects of contempt and hatred that a majority of the French feel for the political elite they are dealing with! This treaty will certainly not bring the two peoples closer together, but in fact it will divide them.
This treaty is a punch below the belt to the citizens’ demands: it includes strengthening the euro, which is the main cause of the imbalance between the two countries and of the decline in purchasing power the Yellow West are rightly complaining about: being neither xenophobic nor germanophobic, in view of this contempt they might however become so. •
* Mouvance France is a political association independent of the party landscape. It has positioned itself in clear contrast to the current Government’s policy. The Board comprises the following persons, among others: Roland Hureaux (President), Dominique Marcilhacy, Elisabeth Faure Viard, Francis Choisel, Tarick Dali, Serge Federbusch, Guy de la Barthe, Michel Leblay, Karim Oouchikh, Guillaume de Thieulloy
(Translation:Current Concerns)
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