Does Russia have the upper hand in the French presidential elections in 2027 ?

I’ve been thinking about this upsetting question for quite some time now. As of September 29, the last IFOP poll shows the following :

·      Marine Le Pen’s « Rassemblement National (RN) » would take 35% of the votes in the first round

·      Jean Luc Mélenchon’ « La France Insoumise (LFDI)» would come in as number 2, with 17%

·      Eric Zemmour, the leader of the far-right « Reconquête » party, 5%

·      The French Communist party 2%

Adding these votes (bizarre, non ?) would give us a total of 59% of French vote intentions…

Why would you add 2 Far-right and 2 Far-left parties ? Well, they all want the war to stop in Ukraine, whatever the cost for Ukraine, they respect Putin and Russia, and they despise the European institutions. Of course, time has diluted the most fierce anti-Nato or anti-Brussels voices, but, like always, it’s inbedded in the cement on which these parties are standing.

It’s just like the recent reminder that the RN has historically been an antisemitic movement. The French leftist media Mediapart recently published evidence of Jordan Bardella’s antisemitic past, between 2013 and 2015. That is also in the DNA of his party, even though some of my jewish friends in France have had a tendency to forget it, as LFI has taken the antisemitic lead in the meanwhile… Scary.

History is never far away, as the recent events in the world remind us. And that is always true with the history of political parties.

Now, what I fear the most for 2027, is a potential red carpet rolled out in Paris for Putin, with devastating consequences for Ukraine, Europe, and Democracy.

Let’s take some steps back.

On October 2^nd , I read the Swedish daily Svenska Dagbladet as usual with a beer in my sauna;)

In its edition, one of the editorials was titled « Advantage Russia ahead of the French election », signed by the foreign analyst Therese Larsson Hultin.

The subtitle read : « He wants to leave NATO completely, she only wants to leave the defense alliance. Now there is growing concern that this spring's French presidential election will have far-reaching consequences for Europe's security. »

« He » is obvisouly Jean Luc Mélenchon, when « She » is Marine Le Pen…

The two have been leading the polls for the last couple of months, with a clear advantage for Le Pen. But the perspective of having them facing each other in the second round is what is so scary, as Marine Le Pen's victory would be quasi certain (to be clear, a Mélenchon victory would be just as scary!). So, let’s not spend time now on why we are where we are. Having the same symptoms as in most European democracies today, French populism is built on the long term effects of demographic, economic, political trends, that have most of all been sluggish, with our societies dynamics having faded.

Many of the topics around this surge of populism have been treated in this blog and the point is not to focus on them right now.

The idea with this piece is to ask why the French are ready to vote for pro-Russian parties at a time when Europe is under more and more Russian threats, and most of all, Ukrainians are dying daily on the front and in their cities, defending a buffer zone between Russia and the EU !

The first answer is in the graph below :

I trust you understand some basic French, but to be sure, by order of importance, the worries are : 1/ Crime and violence, é/ Inflation, 3/ Climate change, 4/ Poverty and inequality, 5/ Immigration, 6/ Health system, 7/ Taxes, 8/ Unemployment.

I sent a message to Ipsos, asking whether European Geopolitics (ie the war in Ukraine) would be one of the topics that eventually doesn’t show on the graph as it would rank too low? I got an answer from Yves Bardon, Director of Foresight at Ipsos, that I share with you :

« Yes, the question is asked, but without specifically mentioning Ukraine: "Military conflict between nations"; 12% of French people say they are concerned about it, placing them at the lower end of the range among the 30 countries surveyed.

Conversely, Israel (43%) is the most worried country, followed by Poland and the Netherlands in Europe. The global average for September was 11%, pulled down by all Asian countries and most countries in the Americas. »

So, with the answers above, it is easy to understand, that there is very little interest in non domestic subjects in France, beyond Climate Change.

This, I guess, is why our longlasting French involvement in the core of Europe, its standing up for democratic values, against autocracies, can come to change radically next year. And what happens then ?

Well, I believe, that it would be the gate open to a « russificication » of France first and the rest of Europe over time.

Now, let’s dig a little deeper into the concrete threats of these pro-Russian ties, and examine how severe it really is.

·      On NATO :

In her editorial, Therese Larsson Hultin in Svenska Dagbladet starts with Jean-Luc Mélenchon, reminding, that the leader of « La France Insoumise », LFI,  has long been a convinced Trostkyist. The development below comes from her editorial, and gives an interesting « foreigner’s » insight about the situation in France.

« Mélenchon has since always been, and still is convinced, that France has to leave NATO. First, only the military part, that is NATO’s command structure under which French troops stand under Nato command in case of conflict. Thereafter, Mélenchon and LFI want France to stepwise leave the defense alliance totally.

The far left leader repeated his thoughts in a blog piece two weeks ago only, under the title « Break up with NATO », saying the alliance has aged too much, a « heritage from the Cold War », that only survived to « enlarge the US ‘ military dominance over the rubble of the Soviet Union ».

Marine Le Pen also wants France to leave NATO’s military structures, even though, since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, she pushed the step forward to the future. To the difference of LFI, though, Le Pen does not want to leave NATO fully, but do as Charles de Gaulle did in 1966. He let France stay in the alliance’s political structures, but kept French control over its forces. It was first under president Nicolas Sarkozyin in 2009, that France took a step back into the alliance’s military part.

Mélenchon’s and Le Pen’s attitudes towards NATO create uncertainty in the defense alliance. And that, at a time, when Europe’s NATO countries focus on building up their own cooperation to become less dependent on the US.

·      France’s nuclear deterrence

Mélenchon says, that France will in no way use its nuclear weapons to defend other European countries. LFI and Mélenchon state that nuclear deterrence is tied to a country’s sovereignty – that it is meant to protect the French people and can not be shared.

Marine Le Pen is on the same line. She can not either think of a French nuclear umbrella to share with Europe, which would equal to abolish it, she stated in an interview with Le Figaro in 2024. « No nation would accept to risk its own doom to save another », she wrote.

So Therese Larsson Hultin concludes : « What happens if France’s next president no longer stands behind the common defense plans, that have been drawn after 2022, and that imply that NATO ‘s commander-in-chief leads the alliance’s forces in case of war ?

Among the experts, diplomats and ministers that I meet, there is concern. Few speak loud about it, but the question remains. Can one trust, that next French president views Russia and a potential war in the same way as its neighbours ? A question, that has its origin in both Le Pen’s and Mélenchon’s historical benevolent attitude to Russia and president Putin. »

Ok, let’s dig a little further into the RN’s historic ties with Russia and Putin.

I found the following summary in the International Center for Counter-Terrorism, ICCT’s edited book, « Russia and the Far-Right : Insights from Ten European Countries ». The piece on France is written by  Nicolas Hénin, a senior reporter. He focuses on the French far right parties.

« On the French political spectrum, the Rassemblement National and Reconquête are the closest parties to the Kremlin’s positions.

·      In 2014, the RN benefitted from two loans from a Russian bank for a total of six million euros, which led to an even more visible alignment with Moscow’s positions (already very compatible) : anti-globalism, anti-liberalism, anti-LGBTQ+, anti-immigration, and perceived resistance to a threatening Muslim world.

·      This ideological proximity concerns not only issues relating to Russia, but international relations as a whole. The RN at the time (and those who left to found Reconquête) were the most virulent in defending and rehabilitating Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria and denying his crimes.  

·      RN member of parliament Thierry Mariani was one of Moscow’s most active advocates in France, founding an association, Dialogue franco-russe, which is a front for Russian intelligence to exert influence, and organising numerous trips to Damascus.

·      Russian support for the RN crossed the boundaries of legality during the 2017 presidential election: the Macron Leaks, an audacious hack and leaks operation carried out with malware developed by Russian military intelligence (GRU) and amplified by the US alt-right through highly visible X (formerly Twitter) accounts and more discreet Telegram channels, aimed to prevent the election of Emmanuel Macron while he was engaged in an electoral standoff against Marine Le Pen.

·      Notwithstanding RN’s actions, it is Zemmour’s civilisational representation of the world which makes him ideologically the closest to the “conservative revolution” ideas promoted by the Kremlin. The Russian ambassador to France indicated in 2015 to the author, when Zemmour was just a columnist not yet involved in politics, that he considered him to be the best analyst of French political life and an asset to work with.

Researcher Adrien Nonjon recalls the reasons for the far right’s fascination with Vladimir Putin: virile, conservative, a defender of traditional values, particularly in the area of morality. Where France is portrayed as in decline, Putin offers the response of a man who is said to have turned his country around when it was plunging into chaos and restored its place in the international arena. Finally, he presents an alternative to the way the Western world is organised, offering a sovereignist alternative to a situation that would otherwise place France in a position of vassalage to the US. »

As for Mélenchon and LFI's long-lasting sympathy for Moscow and Putin

Thornike Gordadze, a Franco-Georgian academic and researcher wrote in « Geopolitics » in August 2024 :

"LFI’s pro-Russian bias has deep ideological roots. It is the heir to the traditions of the French radical left for whom the cornerstone of foreign policy is anti-Americanism. Unlike right-wing anti-Americanism, based on the glorification of national sovereignty, left-wing anti-Americanism is internationalist, Third Worldist, and anti-capitalist. It denounces American imperialism and views the entire spectrum of international politics through this analytical prism. 

Although today’s Russia is in no way socialist or progressive, particularly in view of its oligarchs’ crony capitalism, the ultra-conservative official ideology with its Orthodox overtones, and the treatment reserved for minorities, the LFI and especially its leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon remain Moscow admirers. A visceral hatred of the United States and its policies and basic contempt for liberal democracy are the main explanations for this admiration. 

Mélenchon never utters the word “America” or the “United States of America,” which he stubbornly continues to call “North America.” As a consequence, the LFI supports Maduro’s regime in Venezuela and Castro’s Cuba (at least on paper, their regimes remain socialist), found extenuating circumstances for Bashar El Assad, and often shies away from criticizing Iranian regime.

The LFI, like the RN, after years of complacency towards Putin’s Russia, including when the regime was murdering and poisoning its opponents, annexing Crimea, and waging a proxy war in the Donbas, finally condemned the invasion of Ukraine, but only by paying lip service. Despite calling Putin a “dangerous leader,” Mélenchon continued in 2024 to declare that Putin acted “according to what he thought was useful for his country, just as we act according to what we think is useful for our countries,” a surprising analogy to say the least. Although not as loud as before, the LFI still considers that Westerners are at least partly responsible for the war in Ukraine through their neglect of “Russia’s geopolitical interests” and the waves of NATO enlargement. 

Today, LFI claims to be the party of peace and negotiations and that France “must take the lead in the peace camp” and “dare to create peace.”  Mélenchon’s “pacifist” position would be tantamount to de facto doing Putin’s bidding and accepting a ceasefire while 20% of Ukraine’s territory remains occupied. Emmanuel Macron recently described the LFI’s attitude as follows: “Those who place limits on our commitment to support Ukraine in defending itself against Russian aggression are not choosing peace but defeat.”

In March 2024, Jean-Luc Mélenchon declared: “We are in no condition to confront Russia… no one can defeat a country that spans seven time zones and that has already defeated both Napoleon and Hitler.” With such a stance on the Russian regime, LFI would be a case of useful idiots par excellence to use Leninist terminology. Moscow is not seriously considering the LFI governing France. Still, they are certainly of interest as an anti-system party that could play an essential role in the rise of political polarization and, in turn, strengthen the far right and its arguments.

Why are these parties really of interest for Russia ?

The answers could seem obvious, but I believe, that a reminder is necessary today, as the stakes are very high.

Thornike Gordadzé continues below in his article : 

« While there is still much to distinguish the RN and LFI, and while a political alliance or any kind of coalition seems impossible between them, they do meet the Russian criteria of parties that “stand up today against all the vices of liberal globalism” and whose coming to power in Moscow’s eyes “could radically improve the political landscape of the West.”

A destabilized and weak West could be even more profitable to Russia than a strong, albeit authoritarian one.

« The fact that the far left and the far right cannot join forces to form a government is firmly anchored in French political culture. For the time being, this saves democracy and causes the Kremlin’s disappointment, but Moscow benefits in other ways : the rise of the extremes is a self-perpetuating phenomenon, the political debate becomes radicalized, polarization increases, and moderate and classical political forces are either overwhelmed or forced to follow the extremes in radicalization which, in retrospect, leads to further polarization and ultimately to instability and chaos. »

I find this idea of circular « vicious circle » very interesting, as it explains in a very simple way, why so many democracies are today slowly (or faster in more and more cases) disarmed in front of the growth of populism.

« A destabilized and weak West could be even more profitable to Russia than a strong, albeit authoritarian one. Destabilization not only weakens the Kremlin’s potential geopolitical rivals but also discredits the democratic form of government, a constant internal threat to Putin’s regime.

Could the RN's Criticism of Russia be Trusted?

During the European and Parliamentary election campaigns, Marine Le Pen’s party put a lot of effort into shedding the image of a pro-Moscow party. Jordan Bardella, the party’s new rising star, made relatively decent statements on the war in Ukraine, strongly condemning Russian aggression and supporting Ukraine’s territorial integrity and its right to defend itself, including by sending in French weapons. The main criticism of Macron’s policy in this area concerned the possibility of sending French troops to the region and delivering Kyiv weapons capable of striking Russian territory. “I will not let Russian imperialism absorb an allied state like Ukraine,” Bardella said in a televised debate, pledging both “support for Ukraine and avoiding an escalation with Russia in the interest of France and the French people.”

Bardella’s statements are in line with the official position of the RN since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Marine Le Pen, still the president of the party and its true leader, was forced to admit shortly after the invasion that it was “an aggression” and support Ukraine’s territorial integrity. 

The French media were quick to point out with amusement that during the 2022 presidential election campaign, the RN had to destroy millions of election leaflets showing Marine Le Pen shaking hands with Vladimir Putin. Two years later, during the early parliamentary elections, Ms. Le Pen continued to distance herself from Russia.

Nonetheless, electoral concerns likely dictated this distancing. In 2022, by not supporting the Russian invasion, the RN was able to keep its voters and even increase its number, while another populist far-right party, Eric Zemmour’s La Reconquête, sought to justify Putin’s war in Ukraine by blaming the West, saw its scores halved before and after the invasion. Aware of the danger, Le Pen’s team contented themselves with a brief and swift condemnation of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, preached the virtues of negotiations, and went to great lengths to focus the campaign on the themes of French purchasing power and rising insecurity and criminality in French cities and their suburbs.

Two years on, the same trend persists, but we have reason to believe that it remains rather superficial and that the RN has not fundamentally changed by concealing its pro-Kremlin ties and sympathies.

For a start, the party’s criticism of Russia remains milder than that expressed by the mainstream parties. Bardella’s condemnations of the invasion were immediately followed by his own statements on the necessity of not putting French troops on Ukrainian soil and his opposition to the delivery of missiles capable of reaching Russian territory. Yet France is already delivering SCALP missiles, with a range of almost 300 km, and French military personnel, instructors, and some intelligence officers are already present in Ukraine. This would be a significant change in policy if the RN came to power. 

Later, just a few days after the French parliamentary elections in which the French far-right party, despite its historic first-round score (33.2%), won only a quarter of the seats in the National Assembly and found it had no chance of governing, the party’s leadership announced its alliance in the European Parliament with Victor Orbán’s Fidesz whose geopolitical alignment with Moscow remains solid and unchanged. This announcement also came immediately after the return of the Hungarian Prime Minister from his trip to Moscow, a visit severely criticized by European politicians. 

Moreover, despite the RN’s pledges not to be on Moscow’s payroll, it continues to back this party in France. In a message on the social network X, the Russian Foreign Ministry lent its support to the RN with a smiling photo of Ms. Le Pen and the following text: “The French people are looking for a sovereign foreign policy that serves their national interests and a break with the diktat of Washington and Brussels.” This tweet published by the Russian MFA only a few days before the decisive vote embarrassed the RN’s leadership; some even considered it a sort of Kremlin “kiss of death.”

Unfortunately, the few reactions there were faded within a couple of days...

Conclusion

As I am about to edit this piece, we heard by noon, on the radio, that Trump demands elections in Ukraine, and basically « drops » Zelensky and Ukraine! The day after signing an agreement to buy diesel from his friend Putin.

This world goes more and more crazy…

It is therefore even more time for French voters to « look up » and beyond their own short term worries. I am aware, that this is naive, but, at least, they should demand, that these extreme wing parties clarify their positions and state their future strategic foreign policy principles ahead of the vote. The worst thinkable scenario would be, that the subject does not even reach the debating rounds between candidates that is starting…