Last train to Kyiv

No Wikileaks today about Sapper Jamie Larcombe
No mention of his Afghan mate
They lost their lives at Mirabad last night
Jamie died, despite first aid, unable to be saved
Gunshot wounds killed Sapper Larcombe
Air Vice Marshall Houston sighed
Only 21 years old and his interpreter buried according to local custom.
– Last Train to Mirabad

Un President L Europe et la guerre is a fly-on-the wall documentary showing attempts by Emmanuel Macron, the French President, to negotiate a peaceful solution to Russian aggression in Ukraine. There was distrust of Vladimir Putin by the French advisors throughout the negotiations shown on film. The documentary focuses mostly on these advisors and also on the French president and direct dialogues Macron had with the Russian President Putin.

The documentary makers received very good access to President Macron in the lead-up to and during the war in Ukraine. Some of the highlights of the interviews and meetings were candid in nature where Macron and Putin exchanged views about the situation in Donbass and in Kyiv prior to 24 February 2022 (when the war started). In my comments below, I am reliant on the subtitles provided by the film makers. I rely also upon the auto-translation of French to English in YouTube and to a lesser extent on my school boy French. I have used the machine translation program Deepl to understand some of the comments in Russian.

The failure of diplomacy

Macron stressed the importance of democracy being practically implemented in the region. When he suggested that Putin did not honour the arrangements from the Minsk agreements between the Ukraine government and Russia, Putin retorted that this was not democracy; that Maidan was a military coup in Kyiv in 2014 prior to the 2015 Minsk agreement that was never put in place.

Some of the discussions between Emmanuel Macron and Vladimir Putin reminded me of Stanley Kubrick’s film Dr Strangelove. Particularly this call from the US President (played by Peter Sellers) to the President of the USSR, the fictional Dimitri. Some may find this parallel far fetched. At one point in his telephone discussions with Macron, Putin says that he is at his gym and about to play hockey. Putin says this at a time when Macron and his whole team of advisers are trying to make sense of what he is saying. One of Macron’s chief advisers, E. Bonne, even calls the Russian President a liar (not heard by Putin) when Putin gives his version of a previous conversation.

There are some very candid discussions between Macron and Putin in the lead up to the war breaking out on 24 February 2022. The sticking point was Donbass, an eastern province of Ukraine currently trying to secede from Kyiv with much opposition from Zelensky because of its economic value. The French negotiators do not accept that the Russian section of the Ukraine wants to be part of Russia. The French characterised some people in the Donbass as ‘separatists’ and they did not take seriously Putin’s concern about Ukraine’s military presence in the region.

Putin says to Macron: “Listen Emmanuel, I do not understand your problem with the separatists? They at least did everything necessary at our insistence to open constructive dialogue with the Ukrainian authorities.“

Macron replies: “First thing, the Minsk agreements provide for dialogue with you; it is not expected that the basis for this discussion is a text submitted by the separatists…”

Putin: “We have a completely different reading of the situation.”

Macron: “I don’t know where your lawyer learnt the law. I look at the (Minsk) texts and try to apply them.”

Macron attempted to involve US President Biden early in the negotiations. In January 2022 Macron had just received the rotating presidency of the European Union. Macron is in the ascendancy in the EU now that the German Chancellor Ankgela Merkel has retired. German involvement in these negotiations was negligible. At least from the outside looking in.

Later in the doco one of the advisers said they have a more intimate and transparent relationship with the Germans. Of course there is a strong economic relationship over energy supply from Russia to Germany, and the flow of manufactured goods from Germany to Russia is also important when discussing sanctions. Finally the German Chancellor Olaf Sholz, the Italian Prime Minister Mario Daghi and Macron meet on a train on the outskirts of Ukraine and on the 113 day of the war barrel into Kyiv passing the ‘hero’ city of Irpin where 300 inhabitants were killed in March ’22 under Russian attack that destroyed 70% of the city according to the report. Italy assisted the US and UK to invade Iraq, but France did not. And all three countries, France, Italy and Germany had assisted in the bombing of both Kosovo (1999) and Libya (2011). Therefore none of the countries represented on the train to Kyiv had clean hands when it comes to sovereignty of other countries.

It turns out that one of Macron’s advisers who had appeared throughout the doco till now was previously the French ambassador to Ukraine and is re-united with some of her old workmates in an emotional scene. One had been in a building hit by a missile but survived. The film ends with a discussion with Macron on the train as it rolls into Kyiv.

From the outset Putin was concerned about NATO. When the Russian invasion occurred the European politicians and advisers went into a nuclear bunker in Paris. There were a lot of theatrics in the drama that unfolded. All of the negotiations, save for a couple of meetings between Putin and Macron, were done by telephone. At no stage was Zelensky or his government directly involved in these discussions, nor were the leaders of close neighbours with Russia.

Macron’s chief adviser seemed concerned to make the appearance of negotiation rather than the substance of it. It was a bit annoying to have the advisers appear as a cheer squad for Macron even though the negotiations were going badly from the outset with diverse readings of the facts on the ground by Putin and Macron. I was surprised to see that the French diplomatic service was not involved (with the exception of the unnamed former ambassador to Kyiv) in these negotiations shown in the video. The French ambassador to Kyiv has a cameo role texting with two hands the French President during his Russian/French dialogues with Putin. The foreign service may have been involved, but they weren’t shown. I could not imagine the same thing happening in Australia. For example Foreign Minister Penny Wong would lead discussions with the Chinese while Prime Minister Albanese would be in support, not the other way round, as in this case with Macron taking the leading role in direct negotiatons.

This war must end … but how can it when French capitalists like Macron are talking about the rebuilding of the country that they were unable to prevent being destroyed by civil conflict. I am talking about Donbass, a remote eastern province (at least as far as Europe is concerned) that the Ukrainian Askov battalion refuses to allow to go its own way. How could Donbass, formerly a coal mining region, ever be part of Europe, historically, culturally, or economically?

Before his train ride to Kyiv, Macron visited Lebanon, a place that France had colonised, saying he was there to help the people recover from a huge explosion at the port of Beirut. Lebanon had collapsed economically. At no stage did Macron criticise the Israelis for their invasion and destruction of that country. Nor does Macron criticise Israel’s role in creating the millions of refugee by its illegal occupation of Palestine. Many Palestinian suffer in the camps of Bourj el Baragneh, Shabra and Shatilla a short distanceaway from where Macron walked through the rubble of the Port of Beirut.

No French aid to the Palestinians but billions of Euros in aid for Ukraine. But then, unlike the Anglo-Saxon President of France, the Palestinians are not white. The film shows Macron arriving in Kyiv claiming it for Europe. Also chilling, is one of the main advisers to Macron (E. Bonne) tells the viewers from the train in Kyiv that France has nuclear arms as well as Putin. He does so while a nuclear power plant catches fire after an alleged missile strike by Russian military.

How Kyiv could ever become part of Europe under such circumstances, I know not.

Ian Curr,
10 Sep 2022

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Some pretty incredible footage of Macron talking to Zelensky on the morning of the invasion, when the scale of the full-scale Russian assault on Ukraine was becoming clear.pic.twitter.com/9ETzGScTmp

— Jimmy (@JimmySecUK) September 7, 2022