Change of direction.

Emmanuel Macron has instructed the Ministry of the Armed Forces to draw up a new Military Programming Law (LPM) for the period 2024-2030.

The President of the Republic wishes to adapt budgetary efforts to the new strategic context marked by the return of war to the gates of Europe, he announced on Wednesday.

“While the conflicts are intensifying, we must now reassess our ambitions,” he said during the traditional reception given by the Minister for the Armed Forces on the eve of July 14.

"Our operational ambition for 2030 must be reviewed to better ensure our ability to cope with the prospect of a possible return to high-intensity confrontation," he said.

Rethinking the presence in Africa

The French president has also announced his desire to "rethink all (of France's military devices) on the African continent by the fall", while the anti-jihadist force Barkhane is in the process of completing its departure from Mali. .

Saying he wanted "less calm and less exposed devices", the president judged that it was a "strategic necessity", evoking in a speech to the Ministry of the Armed Forces his desire to "succeed in building long-term intimacy stronger with African armies, rebuilding a capacity to train, here and there”.

"Profound Paradigm Shift"

President Macron also spoke of the need for a "continuum between our diplomatic offer, our renewed actions for the African partnership, our development actions" in Africa.

"It's a profound paradigm shift," he said.

"We must continue our commitment against the terrorist threat everywhere, especially in Africa."

Yesterday a key partner of Bamako, France, a former colonial power, is now persona non grata and is preparing to leave Mali within a few weeks.

The junta in power since 2020 pushed out the French army and appealed to the Russians, via the sulphurous paramilitary company Wagner, even if Bamako denies it.

Policy

Emmanuel Macron wants to reassess French military spending in the light of the war in Ukraine

World

Army: Global military spending hits record high

  • Emmanuel Macron

  • Army

  • Military

  • Africa

  • sahel

  • War in Ukraine