Peevish Trump renews taunts aimed at Macron
President Donald Trump took a peevish tone Tuesday as he revisited complaints about French President Emmanuel Macron, who used a weekend commemoration of the end of World War I to warn the president during his visit to Paris of the perils of the nationalist label he embraces and to suggest he has a lot to learn about history.
Macron called nationalism a dangerous trap and the opposite of patriotism while invoking the bloodiest episodes of 20th century European history.
Trump has shown little patience for the lesson Macron tried to impart or for the two days of praise the young French leader has received since his not-so-veiled criticism of his U.S. counterpart.
Instead, Trump flaunted his embrace of the term “nationist” and suggested Macron Trump
that Macron do the same while arguing the French president was criticizing him to distract from his poor poll numbers.
“By the way, there is no country more Nationalist than France, very proud people-and rightfully so!” Trump tweeted Tuesday morning, followed by, “MAKE FRANCE GREAT AGAIN!”
The taunts on Twitter showed again that Trump does not show any signs that he is troubled by the historical antecedents to the rise of Nazism in Europe and its overlap with modern racists who call themselves “white nationalists.”
In fact, in his tweetstorm against Macron, Trump invoked the Nazi march across Europe.
“Emmanuel Macron suggests building its own army to protect Europe against the U.S., China and Russia. But it was Germany in World Wars One & Two - How did that work out for France? They were starting to learn German in Paris before the U.S. came along. Pay for NATO or not!” Trump wrote.
French Ambassador Gerard Araud corrected Trump to note that Macron had not suggested that Europe needs defending against the United States, just that it should not assume it can rely on its ally, and he added some advice for anyone cheering Trump on.
“You should listen to Europe that has bred two WW and a genocide in two generations,” Araud wrote on Twitter, referring to World War I and World War II. “Nationalism is dangerous. Subject to miscalculation and misperception, it always carries the risk of conflict. Patriotism and cooperation.”