Like the opening phrases of 'A Tale of Two Cities', France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, must feel in these past few weeks that “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” When it comes to selling things that kill, France is the rising star, when it comes to those that save lives, such as vaccines, its sun has been on a long decline. But then this is the president of “en meme temps” (at the same time).
In its most recent report on world arms sales, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute calculated that French arms exports have gone up by some 72 per cent over a decade. The icing on the cake for Macron was the Greek government’s signature this January on a €2.5bn contract for 18 of the Dassault Rafale, France’s jet fighter. The planes will be delivered, some secondhand from the French air force, with a brace of missiles capable of hitting targets over 300 miles away.
Why, is all one can ask? Don’t bother asking what Macron was thinking when he gave the go-ahead for those missiles. What mattered in the Elysée was the joy that such exports bring to patriotic hearts in Paris. “2021 could be a very good Rafale year on the commercial front for Dassault Aviation, and for the whole of the French military aviation industry. It should permit this national sovereign industry to get through the economic turbulence created by Covid-19 a bit more calmly,” announced a New Year story in the business journal La Tribune.
