Emmanuel Macron traveled to north Berlin on Monday to meet Angela Merkel at Meseberg Castle. Objective of this meeting, to put in place a strategy to convince the 27 to give their agreement to the recovery plan, while the German chancellor is preparing to take the presidency of the European Union.

Angela Merkel takes over the presidency of the European Union on Wednesday at a critical time: it is a matter of having the European recovery plan adopted in the coming days, and it is not won.

This plan is a Franco-German idea and therefore the Chancellor and Emmanuel Macron met last night at the castle of Meseberg, north of Berlin, the residence of the federal government. Objective: define the best strategy to reach an agreement with 27 around this recovery plan. This place in Meseberg is charged with symbol: it is there that two years ago, the French president had obtained from Merkel a commitment on the creation of a budget of the euro zone. Idea received lip service in Germany at the time.

Since then everything has changed: the French and the Germans are advancing together, with the president of the Commission Ursula von der Leyen. We compare the three to the Mitterrand-Kohl-Delors trio which had successfully relaunched the European internal market project. 

There, it is a question of saving the European economies which risk collapse if the recovery plan fails.

"We will not fail," Merkel promised last night. She must find a compromise so that this 750 billion plan is accepted by everyone. A third of this sum must be distributed in the form of loans, two thirds in the form of direct grants to the States. What makes scream the most recalcitrant countries, the "frugal".

Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron said it Monday evening: they want an agreement from the European Council on July 17-18, which will also be held in physics for the first time since March. Merkel is playing on her political heritage, she is determined to put all her authority in the balance. The aim of this meeting in Meseberg on Monday evening was to show the whole of Europe that the French and the Germans are fully aligned. It is successful, the image was perfect. It remains to transform the essay.