Letter from La Vigie, 5 March 2025
German elections
Although the SPD lost the elections, it should find itself in government in a coalition led by the CDU in the person of F. Merz. However, conditions are not at all the same as they were under A. Merkel, and there is no shortage of challenges. Germany’s back is against the wall and it is seeking to draw closer to France, which is not in a good financial position, but which has a better energy mix, a good multi-purpose defence tool, as well as a strategic one, and thus retains a certain amount of power. Let’s see this as an opportunity where we can both win, rather than a risk where we will both surely lose.
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Transatlantic rift
The meeting between D. Trump and V. Zelensky in the Oval Office marks a turning point that goes beyond Ukraine: that of a transatlantic rift. Europeans are caught off guard and do not know how to respond. Rearmament is not a policy, and Europeans remain divided on the question of their own security. This puts an end to the fantasy of Europe as a power. We need both realism and imagination.
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Lorgnette: Rearmament: at what price?
European leaders all agree on the need to rearm. This is true of K. Starmer, of E. Macron who talks of 3 to 3.5% of GDP, of the CDU and the SPD who would agree to go into debt for this purpose. But all this raises the question of financing.
This week, Ms von Der Leyen proposed a plan that could raise up to €800 billion. 150 of this would come from unused Covid debt (a truly European resource), with the remainder coming from the debt of the Member States, which would be allowed to deduct up to 1.5% of GDP from the Maastricht 3%. Disadvantage: it is the markets that judge the credibility of a debt, not the European Commission.
This effort will therefore have to be financed. For France, an increase of one percentage point of GDP (assuming we have the underlying strategy, because hardware is nothing without doctrine) means finding an additional €25 billion: a tall order given the state of our public finances. Unless we call into question many of our sacred cows. If the current crisis prompts us to make this effort of truth and rethinking, it will have had a great merit.
JOVPN
Other articles (free reading)
- Le monde remis à l’endroit (J-Ph. Immarigeon)
- Pour une grande stratégie navale et maritime (E. Lambert)
- Une nouvelle armée de terre (E. Marcuz)
- Voyage géopolitique en Écosse
- Bilan n° 106 du 23 février 2025 (guerre d’Ukraine)
- L’Asie-Pacifique, nouveau centre du monde (fiche lecture).
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