The Minister of the Armed Forces, Florence Parly, at the Elysee Palace on December 2, 2020. – Jacques Witt / SIPA
The Minister of the Armed Forces Florence Parly denounced this Monday a “gross political machination” after the publication of a new forum of soldiers, active but anonymous, evoking the risk of a “civil war” in France. “It is a gross political plot first because this morning, a simple reader who read this tribune (on Current values) was counted as a signatory, anonymous naturally ”, declared Florence Parly on BFMTV.
“And then you will certainly have noticed that this forum uses all the rhetoric, the vocabulary, the tone, the references which are those of the extreme right”, she added. “So for what purpose?” Certainly the goal of dividing, of fracturing our nation at a time when it more than ever needs to come together, to reunite, continued the minister. We have just passed a very difficult health crisis. Nothing is worse than wanting to damage the values of the Republic ”.
“Let them appear and assume”
In In an interview with Parisian, this Monday, Jean Castex described as “political maneuver” of “the extreme right” this new forum of soldiers, while expressing his “confidence in the Army”.
“It is a political platform of the extreme right, let’s call a spade a spade”, rebelled the Prime Minister, before criticizing the anonymity of the signatories. “Let them show up and assume if they consider that the essential is at stake,” he insisted.
This text appears less than three weeks after the controversial publication of a first military forum, a majority of whom are retired and some of whose signatories are threatened with sanctions, denouncing the “disintegration” of France and saying they are ready to “support policies. Which will work against.
Soldiers “recently entered into the career”
This time, those who present themselves as soldiers “recently entered into a career” and some of whom have “known enemy fire” in Mali, Afghanistan or the Central African Republic, do not appeal to politicians but also denounce what they are doing. perceive as “the simmering civil war”.
“This forum opens doors on subjects that the government has taken head-on for four years, the fight against terrorism, against communitarianism, against radical Islamism, against trafficking of all kinds, in short everything which is damaging our Republic, ”said Florence Parly. “What damages our Republic is also attacking our armies, their neutrality,” she ruled. The neutrality of our armies is what makes the French have confidence in their soldiers (…) it is an element of national cohesion ”.