Macron does not rule out sending Western troops to Ukraine

President Emmanuel Macron of France said “nothing should be ruled out” after he was asked about the possibility of sending Western troops to Ukraine, The New York Times reports.

Mr. Macron, speaking on Feb. 26, after a meeting of European leaders in Paris to bolster support for Ukraine, stressed that the talks had not resulted in any consensus on putting troops on the ground “in an official, approved and endorsed way.” But he insisted that “anything is possible if it is useful to reach our goal,” which he said was to ensure that “Russia cannot win this war.”

His statements were a stark departure from the usual caution that Western leaders — including Mr. Macron himself — have exercised. They have repeatedly said that they want to avoid escalating the conflict and previously ruled out sending any ground troops to Ukraine.

Ahead of the conference, Prime Minister Robert Fico of Slovakia warned that some Western countries were considering sending soldiers to Ukraine, adding that he opposed the idea.

Mr. Macron did not explicitly say which countries supported or rejected such an option.

“I won’t dispel the ambiguity of tonight’s debates by naming names,” he said. “I’m saying that it was mentioned among the options.”

The gathering of nearly 30 heads of state and top officials drew officials mostly from European countries, including Britain, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland and Spain.

The conflict in Ukraine has been ongoing for two years. President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine said on Feb. 25 that 31,000 Ukrainian soldiers had been killed during the two years of war, acknowledging for the first time a concrete figure for Ukraine’s toll in the war. But, according to The New York Times, his tally is far lower than U.S. estimates, which put the death toll about 70,000.