Don’t count on Tusk to fix Macron-Scholz rift over Ukraine

PARIS  — Hopes are high that if anybody can help jumpstart the broken relationship between German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron over Ukraine, it’s Prime Minister of Poland Donald Tusk.

For the first time since his reelection, Tusk will on Friday join the French and German leaders in Berlin for a summit of the until-recently dormant alliance of the trio known as the Weimar Triangle.

As a veteran politician and EU dealmaker — with experience gained in the darkest moments of the eurozone crisis, when Greece seemed liable to crash out of the currency union — former European Council President Tusk seems ready-made to be the diplomatic mediator of the hour.

But hopes of a breakthrough may well be misplaced, given the extent to which the Macron-Scholz relationship has soured in recent weeks.

The timing of this personal and political falling out could hardly be worse. Donald Trump’s return to power in the U.S. is no longer a long shot, and Europe faces the very real danger of having to contend alone with Russia’s onslaught against Kyiv.

The three-way meeting in Berlin caps weeks of acrimonious bickering, some of it spilling over in public, between Macron and Scholz on European defense and Ukraine. Macron’s pronouncement last month that Western troops shouldn’t be “ruled out” in Ukraine was met with a curt rebuff from Scholz, while the French president’s later call that Europeans shouldn’t be “cowards” was slammed as unhelpful in Berlin.

Tusk might yet be “the game changer,” that the relationship needs, said Alberto Alemanno, law professor at HEC Paris. “He is leading the redemocratization of his country, his position is strong, he can really come as facilitator and get the best out of leaders,” he added.

But, equally, the odds stacked up against Tusk as middleman mean it’s unlikely he’ll be able to mend ties. “I don’t think [the Poles] can easily fix the Franco-German relationship,” said Piotr Buras of the European Council on Foreign Relations. 

“The sources of disagreement between France and Germany lie beyond Tusk’s reach. There are different approaches on a number of issues and a mutual lack of trust between Scholz and Macron,” he added.

Germany still looks to the U.S. for security leadership in Europe, while France entertains visions of a “Europe that protects.”

Tall order for Tusk

The three leaders have no shortage of thorny issues to try to iron out in Berlin: European debt financing for defense, Germany’s refusal to send long-range Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine, and France’s relatively small contributions to the war effort — a major sticking point that the Germans have repeatedly stressed. Macron talks big on the war, but France contributes nowhere near as much Poland or Germany.

Tusk will have many cards to play, not least the fact that he runs the only country at the table that shares a border with Russia — with Kaliningrad on the Baltic Sea. His country also spends 4.2 percent of its GDP on defense — the highest in NATO — at a time when Trump said he would encourage Russia to do “whatever” it wants with countries that don’t meet the alliance’s target of spending 2 percent of GDP on defense.

But beyond the difficult issues, what will make it even harder for Scholz and Macron to patch things up under Tusk’s influence is their personal antipathy and their divergent campaigns ahead of the European election.

“More and more [Scholz and Macron] are struggling to establish a working relationship, and everyday what separates them takes on a more personal edge,” Stefan Meister, a researcher with the German Council on Foreign Relations, wrote in Le Monde.

The French and German leaders are also leading polar-opposite European election campaigns, with Scholz styling himself as the “peace chancellor,” while Macron has decided to push a harder line on Russia to beat back the advance of the far-right National Rally.

According to Alemanno, there is a lot of frustration between staffers on both sides over Scholz’s coalition difficulties and Macron’s leadership style. “This has to be refreshed and it may be that the election campaign refreshes this. They are both challenged at home and this has a debilitating effect on their capacity to come together,” he said.

Nostalgia for Tusk’s previous premiership in the 2000s, when France, Germany and Poland could often club together to drive EU policy, may also be leading to overblown expectations of what the Polish PM can deliver.

He was seen as an effective President of the European Council between 2014 and 2019, helping move EU leaders toward agreement around the summit table in Brussels.

Even then, though, he wasn’t loved by everyone. “He was always so gloomy,” said a senior British official who saw Tusk in action during Brexit negotiations. “Not one you’d look to to try to find a path through warring sides, so he doesn’t feel like a natural fit for the task.”

Poland, France’s new BFF

France certainly hopes Tusk can work some magic on Friday.

Tusk’s return to power has brought about an unprecedented “converging point of view” between Paris and Warsaw, a French diplomat told POLITICO.

“There’s a change of tone in Warsaw due to the reality of U.S. politics; they now need a ‘second life insurance,'” in addition to NATO, the diplomat said. And France has expressed more clearly its vision of European defense as “in addition to and not instead” of the Atlantic alliance, added the diplomat, who was granted anonymity to discuss a sensitive topic.

Paris has noted the positive signs Warsaw has sent in recent days. Even if Tusk denied plans to send troops to Ukraine, Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski said it was “not unthinkable” to put NATO boots on the ground. France and Poland also both want Germany to deliver Taurus missiles to Ukraine, something Scholz has refused to do.

Macron’s sudden switch to tougher talk on Russia appears increasingly aligned with Central Europe, and France has been actively cultivating ties with the Baltic states.

The romance between Paris and Warsaw isn’t absolute, though. Poland is more aligned with Germany on the fundamental importance of the U.S.

Warsaw also sides with Germany over whether to spend EU money on non-European arms purchases. France wants to use the Ukraine crisis to promote European arms businesses — of which it has many — while many other EU countries see this as classic French protectionism and argue the priority must be to arm Ukraine, especially as its war effort falters due to a lack of ammunition.

France’s “renewed activism” toward the east could also backfire if Germany is left feeling cornered, said a diplomat from a European country.

“Historically Germany’s area of influence extends to the east. You’re left wondering whether France is not trying to overtake Germany on its eastern flank,” they added.

Clea Caulcutt reported from Paris and Hans von der Burchard from Berlin. Tim Ross contributed reporting from London.