The president of the United States, Donald Trump, once again attacked his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, on personal grounds regarding the war in the Middle East. During an intervention this Wednesday, a few hours before his speech to the nation, the Republican president assured that Macron “is mistreated by his wife” and that “he has barely recovered from the blow he received in the jaw.” , during a tour of Southeast Asia, and which television cameras captured just before he left the steps of the presidential plane.
Tension between France and the United States continues to grow and Trump is increasingly contributing to relations between both leaders being irreparably damaged. Until now Macron had hardly responded. he demanded. This time, from Japan, the French head of state referred to the latest contempt. “The statements that I have been able to hear and to which you refer are neither elegant nor up to the mark… so… I am not going to respond, they do not deserve a response,” he indicated.
Trump said at the same event that he had requested France’s help to contribute to , a highly strategic area for global hydrocarbon trade. “Emmanuel, we would like to have some help in the Gulf, even if we eliminate the bad guys and destroy the ballistic missiles. Could you send warships immediately?” he would have asked, in his words.
The American president thus expressed his discontent after that telephone exchange during this press conference at the White House. He hinted that the efforts deployed by Washington to secure this sea route were not being sufficiently supported by its European allies. “Many of them have said: ‘We will be there once the war is over’. That’s how I discovered NATO. NATO will not be there if we ever have to face a big crisis,” he ironized.
Macron also responded from Korea to these accusations. “You have to be serious, and when you want to be serious, you don’t say every day the opposite of what was said the day before. If your commitment is questioned every day, it becomes empty of content,” he said. “It is a responsibility that the American authorities assume today by saying every morning ‘we will do this’, ‘we will not do that’ or something else,” he continued, adding: “We all need stability, calm, a return to peace; this is not a show.”
Macron also referred to the military operation as the one desired by the United States to forcibly “liberate” the strategic Strait of Hormuz, blocked by Iran since the start of the war in the Middle East. The French head of state considers that it would be “unrealistic.” “That has never been the option we have adopted, it would take infinite time and entail many risks,” he noted to settle the issue.
