French PM backs Macron’s troops in Ukraine comments

Gabriel Attal has also argued that the deployment of Western soldiers to support Kiev cannot be ruled out

French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal has echoed suggestions that Western military personnel could be deployed to Ukraine, after President Emmanuel Macron vowed on Monday to “do everything necessary to prevent Russia from winning this war.”

Speaking to the RTL broadcaster on Tuesday, Attal argued that “you can’t rule anything out in a war,” repeating several talking points Macron had made following a meeting on the Ukraine conflict one day previously.

“There’s no consensus today to send, in an official manner, troops on the ground,” the French president had said, before adding that “in terms of dynamics, we cannot exclude anything.”

According Macron, a Russian victory in the Ukraine conflict would be a major blow for European collective security.

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Responding on Tuesday to the statements, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov warned that “in this case, we have to talk not about the probability, but rather the inevitability [of a direct conflict between NATO and Russia],” should Western military personnel be deployed to Ukraine.

Meanwhile, the US-led military bloc’s secretary-general, Jens Stoltenberg, told the Associated Press that “there are no plans for NATO combat troops on the ground in Ukraine.”

Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala also argued that existing mechanisms to shore up Ukraine are sufficient, with no “need to open some other methods or ways.”

His Polish counterpart, Donald Tusk, likewise clarified that Warsaw “does not plan to send its troops to the territory of Ukraine.”

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz emphasized on Tuesday that there will be “no ground troops, no soldiers on Ukrainian soil, who are sent there by European or NATO countries” in the future.

Reuters quoted an unnamed White House official as saying on Monday that Washington has no such plans either.