The risk of a wider war in Europe hasn’t been so high since 1945, the French prime minister has said, as efforts towards ending the war in Ukraine speed up under the Trump administration.
French and UK officials have banded together to push for a “reassurance force” of fewer than 30,000 European troops, according to reports, following an emergency meeting in Paris between Kyiv’s allies in Europe.
With US president Donald Trump publicly attacking the Ukrainian president and appearing open to Russia’s demands to permanently occupy eastern Ukraine, fears are growing in Europe of a settlement which is not in the continent’s interests.
“Never since 1945 has the risk of war in Europe been so high,” French prime minister François Bayrou, who was appointed in mid-December by French president Emmanuel Macron, said according to French media.
"For the first time since 1945, war could come to European soil, around us," Mr Bayrou said according to BFMTV.
"We are in a 1930s context with icebergs coming towards us and the Paris meeting at the Élysée did not allow them to be pushed away,” he said on Tuesday.
President Macron echoed the sentiment, stating after hosting the Paris meetings that there is “a very strong convergence to say that Russia constitutes an existential threat to Europeans”.
Mr Macron called a meeting of party leaders in France on Thursday to discuss the situation in Ukraine and any additional efforts needed for its security. Party figures from across the French political spectrum, including Guillaume Lacroix of the Radical Left and Louis Aliot of the far-right National Rally.
UK prime minister Sir Keir Starmer will reportedly present the peacekeeping plan agreed in Paris to US president Donald Trump during a visit to Washington, D.C. next week, as he hopes to lead European efforts to influence the future settlement in Ukraine.
He will push for US fighter jets and missiles to be on standby in eastern Europe to deter Russian forces from breaching any agreed terms, according to reports. A spokesperson for the prime minister said “only the United States can deter Putin from attacking again”.
The plan will see troops stationed in Ukraine’s strategic cities, ports and nuclear power stations - but kept well away from the frontline, Western officials briefed on the plans said according to the Telegraph and Guardian.
There would be a heavy emphasis on intelligence and surveillance capabilities, allowing European countries to send a smaller number of troops on the ground in Ukraine. But they would be backed up by a “US backstop”, which Sir Keir said was the “only way” to deter Putin from attacking again.
The backstop may include US fighter jets in Romania and Poland, or a large multi-national land force stationed on Nato’s eastern borders ready to move into Ukraine if necessary to protect European troops.
Downing Street hopes that Trump will be inclined to accept this proposal, largely as it does not involve having US troops stationed in Ukraine.
But it is impossible to predict which way the volatile US president - who yesterday described Mr Zelensky as a “dictator” after the Ukrainian president said he was living in a “disinformation bubble” - will sway on the proposal.
