French Politics

"We are following a foreign policy which is the outward expression of the democratic faith we profess. We are doing what we can to encourage free states and free peoples throughout the world, to aid the suffering and afflicted in foreign lands, and to strengthen democratic nations against aggression."

— Harry S. Truman, State of the Union, 1949

Since President Truman spoke those words nearly 70 years ago, every successive U.S. president has, consciously or otherwise, taken them to heart. The ideas that the United States should "strengthen democratic nations against aggression" and maintain a network of "free states and free peoples" around the world led to the creation of powerful alliances in Asia, as well as a whole host of transatlantic and European institutions that have kept Europe safe, free, prosperous and allied with the United States: the North Atlantic Treaty Alliance, the Council of Europe, the European Union. Some of these institutions came with costs for the United States, but because they are the bedrock of American power in the world — because America's allies promote American values and its interests around the world — no U.S. administration in seven decades has ever sought to undermine them.

When Donald Trump is inaugurated this month, that will no longer be the case. Trump has made clear that he is no longer interested in promoting America's "democratic faith," or an America that maintains a special relationship with "free states and free peoples." We already know that he envisions, instead, an America that does deals in the name of a narrowly defined national interest. But will he go further than that?

In the past few weeks, some of America's oldest and closest allies in Europe have begun to fear that Trump's White House may not just neglect them, which has happened often enough in the past, but actually seek to undermine them and their institutions. The link between Trump, his senior counselor and chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon and Breitbart News, the website Bannon was running until he went to work for Trump, is what worries them most. Flush from its success in the United States, Breitbart now seeks to monetize anti-immigration and racist sentiment in Europe, too, promoting it, selling it and using it to elect populist politicians who are just as skeptical of NATO as Trump, and who will do their best to destroy the European Union as well.

First up are Germany and France, where Breitbart has announced, in advance of imminent German and French elections, that it intends to open new German- and French-language websites. The worldview of these future sites can be predicted: Breitbart has produced gushing coverage of the National Front, the radical right-wing French political party that is openly funded by Russian money and that advocates, among other things, the end of NATO and a French withdrawal from the European Union. Soon after the U.S. election, Marion Marachal-Le Pen, niece of Marine Le Pen, the National Front leader, tweeted, "I answer yes to the invitation of Stephen Bannon, CEO of @realDonaldTrump presidential campaign, to work together."

Breitbart also frequently and approvingly quotes the Alternative for Germany (AfD), Germany's new anti-immigration party, producing banner headlines and articles composed entirely of attacks on Angela Merkel, the German chancellor. Does Bannon support the rapid growth of the AfD as well as the National Front? It too has leaders who express admiration for Russia, deep dislike of the United States and skepticism of NATO.

More to the point, does Trump support anti-American politicians? We don't know, but there are reasons he might. The answer could lie in Bannon's nihilism, in Trump's own stated belief in the restorative power of crisis and violence ("When the economy crashes, when the country goes to total hell...you'll have riots to go back to where we used to be when we were great") and, perhaps, in this White House's close links to Russia.

Of course the destruction of the transatlantic alliance and the European Union could cause uncertainty and a decline in living standards for Europeans, not to mention violence or real chaos. Of course instability in Europe is not in the interests of U.S. business or politics, either. But a few would benefit. Russia would once again become a major European player. Plutocrats could make money out of the disaster — hedge funds famously prefer instability. In the wake of the revolution, all kinds of unexpected people might rise to power.

Clearly there are other members of Trump's team who won't like the idea of chaos in Europe. It's hard to imagine the collapse of NATO appealing to a James N. Mattis or Rex Tillerson. But because no one knows who will have the president's ear, Merkel, in the words of one German weekly, has already started "preparing for the worst."

It's an existential moment for all of Europe's leaders, most of whom are only just beginning to grapple with the fact that Russia wants to destroy the Euro-American alliance.

A few generations after Truman, will they have to prepare for an American government that wants to do so too?

In May last year, then French Economy Minister Emmanuel Macron sat down with Socialist lawmaker Christophe Sirugue in the steel town of Le Creusot and asked him to join his new political movement. He said No. Eight months on, others are saying Yes.

A political outsider who has never run for office and hopes to transcend the classic Left-Right divide, Macron suddenly seems to have a fighting chance of winning the keys to the Elysee Palace and becoming president before he turns 40.

The latest polls show him breathing down the necks of conservative frontrunner Francois Fillon and the far right's Marine Le Pen and he is drawing larger crowds than both at rallies across France.

Macron's rise is beginning to create cracks in the mainstream parties as more and more local officials disregard party orders and defect to the 39-year-old's campaign.

On the right, four former centre-right ministers have backed Macron, illustrating Fillon's struggle to rally moderates behind free-market policies harking back to former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

Macron's magnetic pull is also being felt at the centre.

When the management of the small UDI party endorsed Fillon, the party's youth wing sent a furious statement announcing that their 130 elected officials and supporters would back Macron.

A "UDI Youth" sign now adorns the door of a small room at Macron's modest presidential campaign headquarters in the 15th district of the French capital.

Long-time centrist presidential hopeful Francois Bayrou, who may get about 5 percent of the vote, is facing growing calls from his base to throw in the towel and rally behind Macron.

SOCIALIST PANIC

The momentum behind Macron is starting to sow panic too in the ranks of the Socialists, who fear they have little chance of making the runoff in May after five years of uninspiring rule by President Francois Hollande.

Fifty Socialist members of parliament have already joined Macron, according to his team, defying threats of expulsion from their own party.

Even in remote regions of the country, he is attracting more people to rallies than his rivals. More than 2,000 supporters attended his event in the central city of Clermont-Ferrand this month, for example - while former Prime Minister Manuel Valls, who is gunning for the Socialist ticket, only pulled in 300 people there, according to local media.

"There's a real possibility that at some point the dyke breaks and the Socialist party starts haemorrhaging officials towards Emmanuel Macron," Jerome Sainte-Marie, head of pollster Polling Vox, told Reuters.

An Odoxa poll this month showed Macron would get 16 percent to 24 percent of votes in the first round in April, putting him within a whisker of Le Pen and Fillon.

In the latest Harris Interactive poll, 41 percent said they "trusted" Macron and he was more popular than Fillon for the first time in a December poll by Odoxa.

FRESH FACE

Macron followed a path well-trodden by the French elite, attending the prestigious Sciences Po and Ecole national d'administration (ENA) schools and then joining the finance ministry.

He then moved to investment bank Rothschild & Cie in 2008 and made a small fortune brokering a $10 billion deal between Nestle and Pfizer before joining Hollande's presidential staff and becoming economy minister in 2014.

Macron quit in November to focus on his "En Marche!", or "Onwards!", political movement which he established in April.

Written off as a presidential hopeful then, Macron has become France's most popular politician in just a few months, his image a regular feature of Paris boulevard newsstands.

Macron's popularity is an achievement in a country where many hold a disdain for the world of high finance and much of his broad popularity is down to his attempts to bridge the Left-Right divide that dominates French politics.

He made a name for himself criticising sacred cows of the French "social model" such as the 35-hour working week, iron-clad job protection and civil servants' jobs for life.

But in a country where many often end up voting for the candidate they dislike least, part of Macron's appeal can also be put down to a deep yearning for a fresh face.

He stands out in a race dominated by figures who have been sparring with each other for decades. He is a generation apart from 62-year-old former prime minister Fillon and 10 years younger than Marine Le Pen.

Many Socialist and conservative grandees have long dismissed the Macron phenomenon, deriding him as a shooting star destined to crash and burn in the run-up to the two-stage election.

But with less than 100 days to the election there is no sign yet the media frenzy around him is starting to subside.

TWO THIRDS

One Socialist MP, who declined to be named, said as many as two thirds of the party's lawmakers could swing behind Macron if the Socialists choose one of the most left-wing candidates at their primaries this month.

"Beyond the presidential election, those M Ps are getting worried that if Macron remains high in the polls and fields his own candidates in the legislatives, they're dead," he told Reuters.

Analysts warn, however, that as Macron's reform programme becomes clearer, especially on how he intends to cut public spending, the harder it will be to appeal across the spectrum.

He has yet to release a full manifesto but, aware of the need to attract left-wing voters, now says he wants to reform the 35-hour working week and the country's wealth tax, rather than scrap these emblematic Socialist policies.

"There are some real question marks hanging over him," said Celine Bracq at the Odoxa polling institute. "His popularity today will not necessarily foretell success in the presidential election."

But others are prudently hedging their bets.

Sirugue, the Socialist MP who turned down Macron in May, told Reuters that the presidential hopeful had since toned down his free-market message and was now more presentable.

"We're not poles apart," said the lawmaker, who replaced Macron at the economy ministry. "If you're asking me who I'd choose between Macron and the Right's candidates, there isn't a shadow of a doubt."

(Additional reporting by Emmanuel Jarry; editing by Richard Balmforth and David Clarke)

The French presidential candidate Marine Le Pen has reiterated her support for Russia's claim on Crimea in a newspaper interview in which she made another decisive tilt towards Moscow, the International Business Times reported.

With three months before France goes to the polls, the Front National leader said she recognised Crimea as being part of Russia and if elected, she would push for a dropping of sanctions against Russia which France had backed simply because it was following German orders.