During a summit organized in Paris by French President Emmanuel Macron to take stock of the situation in Ukraine, the idea of sending Western troops to Ukraine came up for the first time. Macron himself spoke about it, breaking what has been taboo until now.
“Sending troops cannot be ruled out,” the French president explained. “Today there is no consensus on the official introduction of ground troops, but in the long term nothing can be ruled out.” Serving two masters, covertly, Macron actually reiterated that the general principle is not to go to war with Russia, but “I claim some form of strategic ambiguity,” explaining that he doesn’t want to give Putin the advantage of being sure the West will never intervene.
This proposal apparently has not found much success among European leaders. Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico confirmed that Europe was “pondering the possibility of sending soldiers to Ukraine” on the basis of bilateral agreements, adding that this would be a “huge escalation of tensions.” Fico called the summit organized by Macron a “military meeting,” explaining that in this way the massacre would continue.
Polish President Andrzej Duda, as reported by RBC Ukraine with reference to Polish media, explained how heated the decision on this issue was: “There was absolutely no agreement.”