TAICHUNG (Taiwan News) — After spending around six hours with Chinese leader Xi Jinping (習近平) on the presidential plane COTAM Unité jetting between Beijing and Guangzhou, French President Emmanuel Macron spoke with reporters from Les Echos and Politico.

What Macron told them has set off a firestorm of controversy among NATO allies in Europe and in Washington, speaking of “strategic autonomy” for Europe and not being a “vassal” of the U.S., reducing reliance on the U.S. in weapons and energy, and in support of reducing the “extraterritoriality of the U.S. dollar,” taking the position backed by both Beijing and Moscow.

At a time when NATO is working hard to project unity and work as a unit over the war in Ukraine, this sounded very discordant. However, much of the context for his remarks centred on Taiwan.

To Politico he said “the great risk” Europe faces is that it “gets caught up in crises that are not ours, which prevents it from building its strategic autonomy,” presumably regarding Taiwan. Politico continued:

“The paradox would be that, overcome with panic, we believe we are just America’s followers,” Macron said in the interview. “The question Europeans need to answer … is it in our interest to accelerate [a crisis] on Taiwan? No. The worse thing would be to think that we Europeans must become followers on this topic and take our cue from the U.S. agenda and a Chinese overreaction,” he said.

Later, Politico had these passages:

“Stability in the Taiwan Strait is of paramount importance,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who accompanied Macron for part of his visit, said she told Xi during their meeting in Beijing last Thursday. “The threat [of] the use of force to change the status quo is unacceptable.”

Xi responded by saying anyone who thought they could influence Beijing on Taiwan was deluded.

Macron appears to agree with that assessment.

“Europeans cannot resolve the crisis in Ukraine; how can we credibly say on Taiwan, ‘watch out, if you do something wrong we will be there’? If you really want to increase tensions that’s the way to do it,” he said.

It gets worse

It turns out that to get the interviews, the reporters had to give Macron’s presidential office the ability to “check” and “proofread” all presidential quotes to be run in the articles, and according to Politico, “some parts of the interview in which the president spoke even more frankly about Taiwan and Europe’s strategic autonomy were cut out.” Considering how incendiary the quotes that were allowed were, the mind reels at what must have been cut.

Adding insult to injury, while they were on the presidential plane, which must include good communications equipment, China began their latest live-fire war games around Taiwan. It’s hard to imagine worse timing for Macron to be making these comments.

President von der Leyen stood her ground, taking clear principled stands prior and during the trip, no doubt contributing to her chilly reception by the Chinese. Macron and his delegation of 50 business leaders got a far warmer reception, no doubt due to his talk of transatlantic disunity and “strategic autonomy.”

Other than some nice words and fancier banquets, it appears that Macron got little to nothing from the trip other than raise ire in the capitals of his NATO allies. Perhaps he thought his Charles de Gaulle-esque talk would impress his hosts and the journalists, but the fact is, Macron does not have the national strength and personal weight of the former French wartime general.

Disturbing and delusional

Macron’s comments on Taiwan were both disturbingly unprincipled and shockingly ignorant coming from a national leader of a major economic and military power.

With war raging on his own continent, Macron should be acutely aware of the importance and humanity of being a proudly democratic and free nation in the shadow of a hegemonic authoritarian state. France has historically played an important role in defending and promoting democracy, but Macron would rather pander to Xi in the interests of his business delegation than have the slightest bit of concern for the wishes and even lives of the 23 million Taiwanese.

But could a case be made that he is just looking out for the interests of France? This is where Macron is delusional, he’s actually undermining the interests of France and the French people.

If war were to break out in the Taiwan Strait, the world economy would plunge into a worldwide economic depression. The economic disruptions, supply chain shocks and inflation caused by the pandemic and the Russian invasion would seem like minor disruptions comparatively.

Sanctions, blockades, and the war itself would shut down almost all trade with China and Taiwan, and both play crucial roles in the world economy. Japan and especially South Korea could also be cut out of the world’s supply chains.

Even if Japan and South Korea managed to keep some trade going, ships would have to reach Europe by the Panama Canal or take the long way around the South China Sea, which would snarl supply chains and increase shipping costs significantly. What would probably drive up costs even more, however, is that for both shipping and air freight, being so close to a war zone would cause insurance to skyrocket in cost.

Problems for France

About half of the world’s trade flows through the Taiwan Strait, so the disruptions to world trade would be massive. Perhaps Macron is thinking: “so what, that’s a problem for the rest of the world, those four countries take less than 10% of our exports.”

It is true that the European Union takes up the lion’s share of French exports. The problem is with what they import from these four key countries.

Take four of the top five export products from France: industrial machinery, motor vehicles and parts, electrical machinery, and aircraft. All four of those require semiconductors, the majority of which come from those four countries.

Additionally, rare earths which are used in many of the components that go into those products (such as batteries) all largely come from China. A Taiwan Strait war means no more Airbus and Renaut production for the French domestic market, never mind to export.

The remaining entry in the top five French export products is pharmaceuticals. The majority of the active pharmaceutical ingredients that are the necessary components to make those pharmaceuticals come from China.

Those top five industries would collapse, with the resulting job losses. East Asia is also a huge market for French cosmetics, wines, and luxury goods and the resulting losses would also mean many jobs lost.

Those are just the top exporters. That does not include all the businesses that rely on those exporters, and their employees still having jobs, to make money and continue to employ their staff.

Rioting in the streets

Considering that the French have been rioting for the last few weeks over raising the retirement age from 62 to 64, imagine how the French would react to mass unemployment not seen since the Great Depression.

Then there will be inflation and shortages. Just using two examples, in 2021, China alone manufactured 67% of the world’s cell phones and Taiwan and China make a high percentage of all personal computers and related products.

What little would remain of the supply chain would probably be nearly wiped out after losing access to chips and rare earths to make batteries. Taking that much supply out means that what little remains will skyrocket in price and become unaffordable to the average person.

Need a new cell phone or laptop? You might need to sell a kidney.

This is the tip of the iceberg, the knock-on effects of all of this would ripple out and engulf the entire economy of France and the world.

Answering Macron's question

If China were to succeed at taking Taiwan, there is a high chance that the western Pacific and South China Sea will become the playground of the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN). Does Macron really think that Xi would just stop at Taiwan?

Dictators do not usually stop until they have to. Macron would be advised to remember that France has three territories in the western Pacific.

If Macron were to take the attitude he took during his trip to China, those who did fight to save Taiwan might not be so enthusiastic about coming to France’s aid should their territories come under threat. It would be a shame if something were to happen to them, Mr. Macron.

Macron’s appeasement of Xi and lack of a moral stance does not create “great risk” for Europe. It’s precisely the opposite.

Macron said: “The question Europeans need to answer … is it in our interest to accelerate [a crisis] on Taiwan?” The answer is that by not standing united with democratic allies in deterring Xi from launching an invasion in the first place, you are accelerating the crisis by helping convince Xi that democratic disunity will make the costs of invading Taiwan more acceptable.

It does incur costs now to deter a Chinese invasion of Taiwan, diplomatically and economically with China, and in building up militaries to a credible strength. At the end of the day, however, if a war does break out, the costs will be exponentially higher, not just for France, or even just Taiwan, but the world.