Macron Saying NATO is ‘Brain Dead’ May Be Right But He Didn’t Exactly Break Any News Here

• Macron Saying NATO is ‘Brain Dead’ May Be Right But He Didn’t Exactly Break Any News Here
  by John Laughland, https://www.rt.com/
  Emmanuel Macron says that NATO is “brain dead” but the epithet perhaps applies to him.
  –
  The French president has shocked allies by telling the Economist that NATO is in a “state of brain death.” He claims this is because of US and Turkish unilateralism: not only has Trump shown himself to be a NATO-skeptic, demanding that European allies pay more for American weapons, but also Turkey, with tacit US backing, has attacked the Kurds in Syria, Europe’s allies, without consulting the Europeans.
  –
  However, several things about this statement indicate that Emmanuel Macron has lost the ability to think, if by thinking we mean making sure that one does not say things which are so self-contradictory that they do not make sense.
  …
  The first thing to note about this outburst is that Macron is copying the words of his mentor, Jacques Attali, who last month said “NATO is dead.” Attali also proposed the same solution as Macron later did – the creation of an autonomous European military capacity, independent of NATO.
  –
  Jacques Attali, an ex-Marxist prophet of globalisation who was the first head of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development until his lavish overspending caused him to resign in disgrace, is a very important influence on Macron. He was one of the key people to attend the dinner celebrating Macron’s victory in the first round of the presidential elections in 2017. Two years on and the youthful French president seems to have remained a faithful instrument of his master’s voice.
  –
  Second, neither man has explained why Turkey’s unilateral action in Syria is anything new. The US and Britain famously attacked Iraq in 2003: this occurred without the approval of NATO and in the teeth of opposition from France and Germany. France’s then president, Jacques Chirac, even indicated that he would veto any resolution authorizing the attack in the UN Security Council. Why was NATO not proclaimed brain dead then?
  –
  read more.

Europe, stands on 'the edge of a precipice,' and will 'no longer be in control of our destiny,' unless it starts behaving like a geopolitical power.- Macron

MORE: https://t.co/o1QjZQFJZo

— RT (@RT_com) November 7, 2019

end