'French Support for Ukraine Not Ironclad'- Pothier

Should we get a significant number of seats in parliament for the National Rally? Should we get a National Rally premier or Prime Minister in France would support with French support? That's been pretty ironclad for Ukraine. Be questioned 1st. That would challenge a bit the premise of your question. I don't think France's support for Ukraine has been ironclad. I think President Macron has come around only I would say over the past year in having a much stronger stance against Russia and much more positive towards Ukraine. Before that we had this phone diplomacy which actually was getting at odd with the rest of the allies. So yes, France matters. France is a major European military power, but actually if you look at the numbers, France is not delivering more than Lithuania. So with all respect for Lithuania, I think France is punching still below its weight. So yes, it would be an upset politically, symbolically, if France were to withdraw its support for Ukraine, but it would not be a major blow as if, for example, Germany were to withdraw its support. Well, that's really important context in terms of the French support for Ukraine and the fact that, as you say, your analysis is that they're still punching below their weight. Do you take them at their word, National Rally? Do you trust them when they say they've moderated their position, of course, on Russia, they've moderated their position on Ukraine. Can we trust them on that? I think it's a bit of a melony way of, of presenting things. Meaning there might be a core. There is most probably a core in the hassle blame on national that is very pro Russia and very anti Ukraine. But politically and, and, and I would say tactically, they're making the choice of watering this down and and trying to stay not too far from the mainstream and not exactly in the mainstream. They are still voicing their some criticism and there are the differences, but not as far as it could cost them too many votes. So I think they're applying the Melanie recipe here hoping that it will get them in of votes from the from the mainstream. OK, so that's on the national rally and of course Macron's party still polling in 3rd place behind the leftist grouping as well. So polls suggesting that you will get a political jamming up of the system essentially across the French parliament and that pushing through a policy agenda will be that much more difficult given the political arithmetic, what that mean in terms of practical support, military funding and funding for the economy of Ukraine. Does it just dry up in that scenario? This is when you get into the the Fifth Republic constitution and the how the executive can take some executive decisions without necessarily getting the parliament to vote or giving the parliament to say. Generally under the French Fifth Republic system, the executive has a great say on matters of national security and foreign policy. Of course, here the problem is the executive might be split between the President Macron that is supporting Ukraine and the Prime Minister and the rest of the government that is more Ukraine skeptic or or neutral in the best case scenario. So, so here would be, I will say a real battle as to who can get away with what in terms of decisions. Macro will be able at a high level strategic forum to be able to obviously voice France's message and position on Ukraine. But when it comes to money, when it comes to practical support, he will need the government to follow. And this is where there might be a tension in the system and there might be some real difficulties in getting France to follow through its commitments that he just made a few months ago in this France, Ukraine, bilateral security agreements.