Makis Andronopoulos: Macron turns on the “lights” of Europe and “beheads” Germany

“If we are attacked, it is because of our values, our defense of freedom and our will not to succumb to terror.”
Emanuel Macron

Why did Macron add fuel to the fire by projecting Charlie Hebdo sketches on French walls? Why did he denounce Erdogan as a promoter of jihadism? Why did he open Pandora’s box? Out of stupidity? Out of anger? Because of idealism? Or is it a political tug-of-war that primarily concerns Franco-German competition, but is part of a major geopolitical and geo-economic game that is in danger of taking on the characteristics of a “war of civilizations”?

Does Macron want something like that? Obviously not. But he wants to put a stop to the radicalization of French Muslims of Arab and African descent and immigrants that arrived over the past decade. It has been only fifteen years since the Paris banlieu uprising and far less than the Nice and Bataclan massacre. The beheading of Professor Samuel Patti was a good opportunity for Macron to turn on the “lights” of Europe.

This was preceded by Nicolas Sarkozy in 2009 when, on the occasion of the invasion of the burqa in France and its ban, which showed the complete failure of the system of integration of Muslims, he boldly opened the debate on French national identity. He denounced the reluctance of some to “share a common culture, a common imagination, a common morality” and called on those who wished to link their destiny to that of France to share its history and culture. “Being French means accepting a form of culture, values, and behavior.”

Macron’s political stance provoked the three executions with a heinous beheading in Nice and polarized things. However, he rallied the French people, as well as the vast majority of Europeans, around his person. He can certainly expect the recovery of his popularity and that of his party, but also the limitation of the influence of Marin Le Pen’s Alarm. But it is not just that. It is much more.

Macron and the Treaty of Elysées

To understand this move of Emanuel Macron, one must understand his existence beyond the stereotypes that want him to be a member of Rothchild’s bank. Undoubtedly, Macron is an idealist, a hunter of the ideal, not only because at the age of twelve – although he came from a secular (atheist) family – he was baptized a Catholic, but mainly because he studied philosophy at Nanterre. He also did postgraduate studies in public relations and was trained at the National School of Management. It is indicative, however, that he worked as an editorial assistant in the great work “Memory, History, Forgetting”, by the Protestant philosopher Jean-Paul Gustave Ricœur.

Let us also note that Emanuel Macron was a member of the Socialist Party from 2006-2009 and as Minister of Finance and Economy (2014-2015) in the Valls government, under the presidency of François Hollande, he resigned so much because his policy package did not pass the Parliament, as well as because he had opposed restrictive German policies. In fact, when German surpluses were much higher than the 6% allowed by the European Treaty and Berlin prevented the completion of banking consolidation.

Recall also that in 1871 Prussia defeated France, annexed Alsace and Lorraine, and humiliated the country by crowning Willhelm in the Hall of Mirrors of Versailles as emperor of the German Reich by Bismarck. Since then the French have lost more wars to the Germans.

In 1963, the Treaty of Elysées was signed in Paris by Federal Chancellor Adenauer and General de Gaulle, which sealed the reconciliation between the two peoples and formed the basis of a partnership of mutual geopolitical interests that gradually might even evolve into a “merger” of the two states. In this axis, France would “wear the pants” and would have the political leadership and Germany the economic management.

However, the economic strength that Germany gained after the unification and implementation of the euro in its measures, led to a sharp increase in its political power within the EU and the removal of the “pants” from France. Sarkozy’s theatrical performances with Merkel were shows for internal consumption. Hollande did not care, he had other concerns. But Macron knows that a brake must be put on the Germanization of Europe. And that is where the geopolitical and geo-economic dimensions begin.

What Macron sees

President Macron knows that Germany has taken a “special path” (Sonderweg) in modern history, driven by a mixture of ideologies and metaphysics based on the religious notions of the state and destiny. He knows the creepy “Schedule of September” of Chancellor Theobald Theodor Friedrich Alfred von Bethmann-Hollweg presented to Kaiser Wilhelm II on September 9, 1914.

Chancellor von Bethmann-Hollweg suggested, “creating a Central European Economic Union through customs treaties that would include France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Austria-Hungary, Poland, and perhaps even Italy, Sweden, and Norway. . This Union will have no common constitutional supreme authority and all its members will be officially equal, but in practice, they will be under German leadership and will have to consolidate German economic sovereignty over Central Europe. ”

Macron knows that Hitler was influenced by Friedrich Naumann’s “Mittel Europa” (Central Europe) pan-Germanism, which evangelized a confederation of Germany, Austria-Hungary, Belgium, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and the Balkans, that would serve as a regulated “economic union”.

He is also aware of the German doctrine of Grosswirtschaftsraum (large economic area) according to which Germany can never be on the same level as the USA, Russia, France, Britain, Japan, if it does not take advantage of its neighboring countries. After all, he saw it in the role Germany played in the break-up and the war in Yugoslavia. He saw it in the German investments in the countries of the former Eastern bloc, he saw it again in the orange revolution in Ukraine.

He sees it in Germany’s policy in the Balkans, in Greece, which was turned into a “debt colony” with ten-year disarmament at the same time, he sees it in its policy in the Greek-Turkish conflict, in Cyprus, and in the energy resources of the Eastern Mediterranean. He sees it in the equipping and support of Islamic Turkey. He sees it in NATO, he sees it in blocking his proposals for the democratization of the eurozone and the European Union. Europeans know all this…

Germany-Turkey axis

Today, the defeated central empires of World War I, the Kaiser and the Sultan, claim in a postmodern way, the recovery of their lost lands, in a paradoxical regression of history. Germany uses diplomacy in the “Berlin Process” and Turkey uses military force. The combination of power is strong and ambitious and extends from Eastern and Southern Europe, the Mediterranean to sub-Saharan Africa.

It is no coincidence, then, that through a proxy Turkey, which has taken on the dirty job of leading the jihadists, Germany is implicitly, indirectly, or directly, involved in all the “hot” places around the Mediterranean. This has been evident since the time of the French proposals for the Mediterranean two decades ago. Now, for example, he has blocked – along with satellite Italy – Turkey’s support of jihadists and Fayez al-Saraj.

The Macron movement is a game-changer. The war on terror and fundamentalism not only awakened the French but the whole of Europe. It is clear that France wants to wear “pants” again…