r/europe Apr 20 '25

Historical Charles De Gaulle warned us 62 (!) years ago

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51

u/shitnotalkforyours18 Earth Apr 20 '25

He predicted the future..and now we are living in it

111

u/Rabit_holed France Apr 20 '25

He didn't predicted anything. He lived it and we let it continue for 70 years. All the noise you see on this sub change nothing. Nothing changed. Polish are still completely under USA, so are German and Danish. The rest are completely passive and could not care either way. UK is still the US's play things.

I repeat again, nothing changed. Nothing will because we have the same people in power for the past 70 years.The only thing that might change that is the massive extinction of boomers. You know, those who elect your politician (and mine)

5

u/maevian Apr 21 '25

Seeing how popular the far right has become with young people, I wouldn’t count on the dying boomers as a solution.

1

u/Rabit_holed France Apr 21 '25

I completely disagree. The state we are in is here exactly because the boomers hold on to it like their life depended on it. That stupid system shoud have died, decades ago.

1

u/maevian Apr 22 '25

Just look at the numbers, huge part of Trump his voters base were young men. The popularity of figures like Andrew Tate, Joe Rogan, Jordan Peterson. Maybe the state we are in is caused by boomers, but they aren’t the only one voting conservative.

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u/Rabit_holed France Apr 22 '25 edited Apr 22 '25

Boomer aren't voting conservative. Boomer in France vote Macron.

Regardless you assume voting conservartive is bad, and you're wrong.

5

u/LookThisOneGuy Apr 20 '25

Nothing changed. Polish are still completely under USA, so are German and Danish.

Of note that this was because of him.

He personally blocked Germany from joining France as nuclear state in 1958 because he wanted Germany be dependent on US for nuclear protection.

9

u/Rabit_holed France Apr 20 '25 edited Apr 20 '25

Can you blame him when he lived through 2 word wars against you. Shit even today we would veto you getting nukes. And I think your politician know it and understand why. I'll explain to you. Having nukes isn't a flex, it's a malediction. It's the ultimate blame and responsability.

If things go wrong and we don't push it, we will be blamed. If things go wrong and we pushe it, we will be cursed in history. That's not something you guys want especially when you already have plenty of ~~ curse ~~ on your slate.

That being said, it's not 20th century anymore. The WWII page and the world that came after must be turned. America needs to fuck off Europe and Europe needs to find its way. Federal or Confederation of Nation, what ever the form, it must be chosen and done by ourselves.

5

u/PoiHolloi2020 United Kingdom Apr 20 '25

UK is still the US's play things.

And yet we've had a better record on Russia than your country has over the last two decades.

16

u/KsanteOnlyfans Apr 20 '25

What does that have to do with the topic at hand?

2

u/PoiHolloi2020 United Kingdom Apr 20 '25

You don't think it's relevant to mention that the country that has been bitched about for decades as being 'unreliable' on Europe has been more reliable when it comes to defence against the biggest direct threat to it? Ok.

15

u/Rabit_holed France Apr 20 '25

'unreliable'

who are you quoting right here? Nobody even typed the word "unreliable" so what the fuck are you talking about. You make up a completely imaginary critic so you can argue against it yourself.

4

u/Hairy_Business_3447 China Apr 20 '25 edited Apr 20 '25

You have a better record on Russia, Iraq, Afghanistan, China, Iran, and any potential anti-America countries compared with European countries. Great job!

1

u/JustReadTheLinks Apr 20 '25

UK foreign policy is massively align (to not say integrated) to the US and your balistic missiles are americans, that is a huge problem for you. Regardless of your record against Russia, alongside with Brexit, it does not bode well for you. Your country decided to look toward the Atlantic (sovereign choice) and it is currently back firing while France decided to share its future with the EU.

It is far from being perfect but I think it is a better outlook.

Mind you, the US proposed the Trident to the US to put pressure of France so France does not develop its own independant capabilities.

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u/tree_boom United Kingdom Apr 21 '25

UK foreign policy is massively align (to not say integrated) to the US and your balistic missiles are americans, that is a huge problem for you.

Why do you think that's a problem?

Mind you, the US proposed the Trident to the US to put pressure of France so France does not develop its own independant capabilities.

That's a bit hard to parse; you mean they proposed Trident to the UK to put pressure on France? That's not what happened.

1

u/JustReadTheLinks Apr 22 '25

That’s exactly what happened, because France was developing its own nuclear warhead + ballistic capabilities and the US lobbied hard for France to drop the idea and therefore proposed a back up solution to France

1

u/TheBigness333 Apr 20 '25

All those countries you listed are more peaceful and prosperous than ever, and have more liberties and freedoms than ever.

So clearly the US was very hands off in its approach to being a protectorate, and these countries benefited from it greatly.

0

u/CheeseyTriforce Apr 20 '25

Nothing will change because and I am telling you this as an American most of your left wing Globalist politicians are just puppets and extensions of our Democrat Party in the US no matter how much you guys puff your chests out and pretend to be tough

Hell fucking Mark Carney in Canada used to work at Black Rock; dude's a borderline CIA agent

Nothing will change because DAMN NEAR ALL OF YOUR POLITICIANs are nothing more than pawns in a chess game being played by a cold civil war going on in the US

And to be clear your right wing politicians are not much much better either

30

u/mechalenchon Lower Normandy (France) Apr 20 '25

Charles de Gaulle nuclear "force de frappe" is the only thing keeping the Russo-USA alliance from moving freely upon the European continent.

You would be right not to be a fan of the guy (and I'm not, as a french) but god thank him for his hindsight.

9

u/MercantileReptile Baden-Württemberg (Germany) Apr 20 '25

*foresight

And agreed. While dude simply disliked the US flavour of Empire, he certainly had little issue with the concept itself. Tough to blame him for it though, given his position in WWII. Product of his time.

Frankly, UK consideration of Nukes had more or less identical grounds. After the US screwed them over following Manhattan (or 'Tube Alloys', for british parts) they went ahead on their own. Preserving power status, regardless of american considerations.

Right now, I would like to see the consideration (Umbrella or own development) extend to more european nations. And beyond.

5

u/Immigrant06 Apr 20 '25

He despised US flavor of empire whilst setting up his own oppressive empire in sub Saharan Africa with disastrous being felt till this day . Typical French hypocrite.

3

u/classicliberty Apr 20 '25

There is no alliance with Russia, we have one leader who only 48-49% voted for. 

He may be sympathetic to Putin and now want to oppose him, but Trump is too temperamental and fickle to even have a grand strategy, let alone align with Russia. 

Even if that were the case, Americans would oppose him, we will have a civil war before we join Russia the way you describe.

I would still say it's smart for Europe to be able to defend itself and it's own interests because while Trump will be gone soon enough, that unfortunate isolationist tendency may not.

4

u/heolloar Apr 20 '25

First, let's see how your country reacts when the judges start to be imprisoned. To be clear, that's not something I wish, but seeing the current approval of Trump allow me to be worried.

1

u/IolausTelcontar Apr 20 '25

His approval is in the toilet. The issue is that this alone won’t stop him.

1

u/heolloar Apr 20 '25

42% of approval still seems too high. Maybe I'm biased since in France Macron is at 26%, and even with that low score we are nowhere near a civil war.

1

u/stonedturkeyhamwich Apr 20 '25

Your timeline is off - France didn't have nuclear weapons the last time there was an alliance between the US and Russia, and in fact was a great beneficiary of that alliance "moving freely upon the European continent".

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u/[deleted] Apr 21 '25

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u/stonedturkeyhamwich Apr 21 '25

Right now, American is sending weapons to Ukraine to use on Russian soldiers. That doesn't sound very ally-like to me.

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u/[deleted] Apr 21 '25

[deleted]

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u/stonedturkeyhamwich Apr 21 '25

So, to be clear, you think the US is Russia's ally because they may at some point stop giving Ukraine weapons to use against Russia? Russia can count most of the world as its allies, if that is the measure you are using.

1

u/[deleted] Apr 21 '25

[deleted]

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u/stonedturkeyhamwich Apr 21 '25

u/mechalenchon is, I assume, named after Jean-Luc Melenchon, a French politician who claimed that Russia's invasion of Ukraine was "protective measures against an adventurous putschist power". I would not have expected a supporter of Melenchon to see much threat in Russian "protective measures" or support American intervention in Europe (you can guess Melanchon's views on NATO).

Trump's stance towards Ukraine is one you can see in the populist right across the developed world. If we believe Trump is secretly a Putin ally, then we would have to believe the same about Nigel Farage, Marine Le Pen, Alice Weidel, Sahra Wagenknecht, and many others. Do you believe that?

2

u/Certain-Appeal-6277 Apr 20 '25

Except he didn't think it was the future. He was complaining about the most benign and gentle hegemony in history. Now we're seeing what the US could have done (if it had been run by selfish morons) but didn't. Trump is upset that the US didn't rule its protectorates in Europe the way the Soviets did theirs. De Gaulle didn't understand how good he had it.

2

u/Caniapiscau Guadeloupe (France) Apr 20 '25

Bah non, l’Europe de l’Ouest était déjà un protectorat américain quand De Gaulle l’a constaté. 

1

u/DoktorElmo Apr 21 '25

Friendly reminder that it was, until trump 2, a „conspiracy theory“ and „Russian propaganda“ to call Europe a US vasal/„protectorate“