The French Army’s drills, which simulate a high-intensity conflict with an enemy of equal firepower, are currently taking place at the massive combat training center (CENTAC) in Mailly-le-camp in eastern France, Politico reported.
“The world has revealed its true nature: unstable, dangerous, and not everyone is a friend. We’re gearing up for a culture of alert, of being ready at short notice. CENTAC is the only place [in France] where you can see what war is like,” Colonel Axel Denis, said Colonel Axel Denis, who runs the 120-square-kilometer training center, as quoted by the news agency.
For comparison, the area of the French capital Paris is about 105 square kilometers.
While CENTAC officers don’t name potential enemies, the training aims to train troops “to fight a foe like Russia,” the report said. The news outlet quoted the officers as saying that the experience of the Ukraine conflict – which underscores the importance of coordinated efforts on the battlefield – is widely used in CENTAC exercises.
These war games come after French President Emmanuel Macron said late last month that he would not rule out sending EU troops to Ukraine, a move that immediately sparked widespread public outcry.
For their part, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Defense Minister Boris Pistorius made it clear that Berlin would not send German troops to Ukraine, with Scholz stressing that NATO countries as a whole would not do so. They were echoed by French Foreign Minister Stephane Sejourne, who pledged that there would be no French troops in Ukraine.
“The French will not die for Ukraine. We will not send troops into combat [there] because the framework has been set, which is to prevent Russia from winning without going to war with Russia. And nothing is excluded within this framework,” Sejourne told reporters.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, for his part, stressed that the possible presence of NATO troops in Ukraine would lead to an inevitable conflict between Russia and the alliance. He added that there is currently no consensus among Western countries on the issue, and that the very fact that NATO countries are discussing the possibility of sending some contingents to Ukraine is “something new”.
“A number of Western countries maintain a rather sober assessment of the potential risks of such an action and the ppossible repercussions of direct involvement in a hot conflict already on the battlefield,” Peskov pointed out.
