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      A Former French President Gives a Voice to Obstinate Russian Sympathies

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      Remarks by Nicolas Sarkozy have raised fears that Europe’s pro-Putin chorus may grow louder as Ukraine’s plodding counteroffensive puts pressure on Western resolve.PARIS — Nicolas Sarkozy, the former French president, was once known as “Sarko the American” for his love of free markets, freewheeling debate and Elvis. Of late, however, he has appeared more like “Sarko the Russian,” even as President Vladimir V. Putin’s ruthlessness appears more evident than ever.In interviews coinciding with the publication of a memoir, Mr. Sarkozy, who was president from 2007 to 2012, said that reversing Russia’s annexation of Crimea was “illusory,” ruled out Ukraine joining the European Union or NATO because it must remain “neutral,” and insisted that Russia and France “need each other.”“People tell me Vladimir Putin isn’t the same man that I met. I don’t find that convincing. I’ve had tens of conversations with him. He is not irrational,” he told Le Figaro. “European interests aren’t aligned with American interests this time,” he added.His statements, to the newspaper as well as the TF1 television network, were unusual for a former president in that they are profoundly at odds with official French policy. They provoked outrage from the Ukrainian ambassador to France and condemnation from several French politicians, including President Emmanuel Macron.The remarks also underscored the strength of the lingering pockets of pro-Putin sympathy that persist in Europe. Those voices have been muffled since Europe forged a unified stand against Russia, through successive rounds of economic sanctions against Moscow and military aid to Kyiv.The possibility they may grow louder appears to have risen as Ukraine’s counteroffensive has proved underwhelming so far. “The fact the counteroffensive has not worked up to now means a very long war of uncertain outcome,” said Nicole Bacharan, a political scientist at Sciences Po, a university in Paris. “There is the risk of political and financial weariness among Western powers that would weaken Ukraine.”A destroyed bridge in Bohorodychne, Ukraine. It is now used as a foot crossing for residents.Tyler Hicks/The New York TimesIn France, Germany, Italy and elsewhere, not even the evident atrocities of the Russian onslaught against Ukraine have stripped away the affinity for Russia traditionally found on the far right and far left. This also extends at times to establishment politicians like Mr. Sarkozy, who feel some ideological kinship with Moscow, blame NATO expansion eastward for the war, or eye monetary gain.From Germany, where former Social Democrat Chancellor Gerhard Schröder is the most prominent Putin supporter, to Italy where a former prime minister, Giuseppe Conte of the anti-establishment Five Star Movement has spoken out against arms shipments to Ukraine, some politicians seem unswerving in their support for Mr. Putin.France, like Germany, has always had a significant number of Russophiles and admirers of Mr. Putin, whatever his amply illustrated readiness to eliminate opponents — most recently, it seems, his sometime sidekick turned upstart rival, Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, who led a brief mutiny two months ago.The sympathizers range from Mr. Sarkozy’s Gaullist center right, with its simmering resentment of American power in Europe and admiration for strong leaders, to Marine Le Pen’s far right, enamored of Mr. Putin’s stand for family, faith and fatherland against a supposedly decadent West. The extreme left, in a hangover from Soviet times, also has a lingering sympathy for Russia that the 18-month-long war has not eradicated.Still Mr. Sarkozy’s outspokenness was striking, as was his unequivocal pro-Russian tone and provocative timing.“Gaullist equidistance between the United States and Russia is an old story, but what Sarkozy said was shocking,” Ms. Bacharan said. “We are at war and democracies stand with Ukraine, while the autocracies of the world are with Mr. Putin.”The obstinacy of the French right’s emotional bond with Russia owes much to a recurrent Gallic great-power itch and to the resentment of the extent of American postwar dominance, evident in the current French-led quest for European “strategic autonomy.” Even President Macron, a centrist, said as recently as 2019 that “Russia is European, very profoundly so, and we believe in this Europe that stretches from Lisbon to Vladivostok.”President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, left, during a meeting with President Emmanuel Macron of France in Moscow in February 2022.Sputnik, via Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesWith Mr. Putin, Russian rapprochement has also been about money. Ms. Le Pen’s far-right National Rally party took a Russian loan; former Prime Minister François Fillon joined the boards of two Russian firms (before quitting last year in protest at the war); and Mr. Sarkozy himself has been under investigation since 2021 over a €3 million, or about $3.2 million, contract with a Russian insurance company.This financial connection with Moscow has undermined Mr. Sarkozy’s credibility, but not made him less vocal.He urged Mr. Macron, with whom he regularly confers, to “renew dialogue” with Mr. Putin, called for the “ratification” of Crimea’s annexation through an internationally supervised referendum, and said referendums should also be organized in the eastern Donbas region to settle how land there is divided between Ukraine and Russia.Rather than occupied territory, the Donbas is clearly negotiable territory to Mr. Sarkozy; as for Crimea, it’s part of Russia. Dmitri Medvedev, the former Russian president and now virulent assailant of the West, hailed Mr. Sarkozy’s “good sense” in opposing those who provide missiles “to the Nazis of Kyiv.”Commenting on Mr. Sarkozy in the daily Libération, the journalist Serge July wrote: “Realism suggests that the meager results of the Ukrainian counteroffensive have suddenly redrawn the Russia map. Supporters who had remained discreet are finding their way back to the microphones. One recalls the words of Edgar Faure, a star of the Fourth Republic: ‘It’s not the weather vane that turns but the wind.’”If the West’s goal was to leverage major military gains through the Ukrainian counteroffensive into a favorable Ukrainian negotiating position with Moscow — as suggested earlier this year by senior officials in Washington and Europe — then that scenario looks distant for the moment.A member of the Ukrainian Marine Brigade getting into position on the southern front this month.Diego Ibarra Sanchez for The New York TimesThis, in turn, may place greater pressure over time on Western unity and resolve as the U.S. presidential election looms next year.Mr. Putin, having apparently shored up his 23-year-old rule through the killing of Mr. Prigozhin, may be playing for time. It was not for nothing that Brad Raffensperger, the Georgia secretary of state who clashed with Donald J. Trump over the former president’s demands that Mr. Raffensperger change the results of the 2020 election, was bizarrely included in a list of people banned from Russia that was published in May.As nods and winks to Mr. Trump go, this was pretty conspicuous.Mr. Macron responded to Mr. Sarkozy by saying their positions were different and that France “recognizes neither the annexation by Russian of Ukrainian territory, nor the results of parodies of elections that were organized.” Several French politicians expressed outrage at Mr. Sarkozy’s views.Over the course of the war, Mr. Macron’s position itself has evolved from outreach to Putin, in the form of numerous phone calls with him and a statement that Russia should not be “humiliated,” toward strong support of the Ukrainian cause and of President Volodymyr Zelensky.There have been echoes of Mr. Sarkozy’s stance elsewhere in Europe, even if Western resolve in standing with Ukraine does not appear to have fundamentally shifted.President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, left, and former President Nicolas Sarkozy of France in 2007 in Moscow.ReutersMr. Schröder, Germany’s former chancellor and, in retirement, a Russian gas lobbyist close to Mr. Putin, attended a Victory Day celebration at the Russian embassy in Berlin in May. Tino Chrupalla, the co-chairman of the far-right Alternative for Deutschland, or AfD, as it is known in Germany, was also present.A significant minority in Germany’s Social Democratic party retains some sympathy for Moscow. In June, Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who has overseen military aid to Ukraine worth billions of dollars and views the Russian invasion a historical “turning point” that obliges German to wean itself of its post-Nazi hesitation over the use of force, faced heckles of “warmonger” as he gave a speech to the party.This month, in a reversal, Mr. Scholz’s government retreated from making a legal commitment to spending two percent of GDP on defense annually, a NATO target it had previously embraced, Reuters reported. Disquiet over military rather than social spending is rising in Europe as the war in Ukraine grinds on.Many people in what was formerly East Germany, part of the Soviet imperium until shortly before German unification in 1990, look favorably on Moscow. A poll conducted in May found that 73 percent of West Germans backed sanctions against Russia, compared with 56 percent of those living in the East. The AfD has successfully exploited this division by calling itself the peace party.“I could not have imagined that German tanks would once again head in the direction of Russia,” said Karsten Hilse, one of the more voluble Russia sympathizers within the AfD, alluding to tanks provided to Ukraine.In Italy, the most vocal supporter of Mr. Putin was Silvio Berlusconi, the four-time prime minister who died a few months ago. Giorgia Meloni, who as prime minister leads a far-right government, has held to a pro-Ukrainian line, despite the sympathies of far-right movements throughout Europe for Mr. Putin.Mr. Conte, the former Italian prime minister, declared recently that “the military strategy is not working,” even as it takes a devastating financial toll.In France, Ségolène Royal, a prominent former socialist candidate for the presidency who has denounced Ukrainian claims of Russian atrocities as “propaganda,” announced this week that she intended to lead a united left-wing group in European Parliament elections next year. It was another small sign of a potential resurgence of pro-Russian sentiment.Mr. Putin has used frozen conflicts to his advantage in Georgia and elsewhere. If there is no victory for either side in Ukraine before the U.S. election in November 2024, “the outcome of the war will be decided in the United States,” Ms. Bacharan said.Reporting was contributed by Christopher F. Schuetze in Berlin, Juliette Guéron-Gabrielle in Paris and Gaia Pianigiani in Rome. More

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      How European Officials View a Possible Second Trump Term

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      The prospect of a second presidential term for Donald J. Trump has many officials worried about alliance cohesion, NATO and the war in Ukraine.For most European governments, it is almost too upsetting to think about, let alone debate in public. But the prospect that Donald J. Trump could win the Republican nomination for the presidency and return to the White House is a prime topic of private discussion.“It’s slightly terrifying, it’s fair to say,” said Steven Everts, a European Union diplomat who is soon to become the director of the European Union Institute for Security Studies. “We were relieved by President Biden and his response to Ukraine,” Mr. Everts said, “but now we’re forced to confront the Trump question again.”Given the enormous role the United States plays in European security,” he added, “we now have to think again about what this means for our own politics, for European defense and for Ukraine itself.”The talk is intensifying as Mr. Trump, despite the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, his attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 election and his various indictments, is running well ahead of his rivals for the Republican presidential nomination and is neck-and-neck with President Biden in early opinion polls.In general, Central Europeans are more convinced that they can manage a second Trump presidency, but Western Europeans are dreading the prospect, especially in Germany, about which Mr. Trump seems to feel significant antipathy.During his presidency, Mr. Trump threatened to pull out of NATO and withheld aid to Ukraine as it struggled with a Russian-backed insurgency, the subject of his first impeachment. He ordered the withdrawal of thousands of American troops from Germany, a move later overturned by Mr. Biden, and spoke with admiration of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.Mr. Trump with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia in Osaka, Japan, in 2019. Mr. Trump, who has praised the Russian leader, said he would end the war in Ukraine in a day.Erin Schaff/The New York TimesToday, with Europe and Russia locked in conflict over Ukraine, and Mr. Putin making veiled threats about nuclear weapons and a wider war, the question of American commitment takes on even greater importance. Mr. Trump recently said that he would end the war in a day, presumably by forcing Ukraine to make territorial concessions.A second Trump term “would be different from the first, and much worse,” said Thomas Kleine-Brockhoff, a former German government official who is now with the German Marshall Fund in Berlin. “Trump has experience now and knows what levers to pull, and he’s angry,” he said.Mr. Kleine-Brockhoff said he remembered talking with then-Chancellor Angela Merkel the night she returned from her first meeting with Mr. Trump as president. As usual, she was “all about managing the man as she had managed dozens of powerful men,” he said. “But no one will think” they can manage “Trump Two.”Several European officials declined to talk on the record about the prospect of another Trump presidency. They do not want to engage in American domestic politics, but they also may need to deal with Mr. Trump if he is elected, and some say they remember him as vindictive about criticism.Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany engaging with Mr. Trump during a Group of 7 summit in Canada in 2018. Many of their exchanges were notoriously frosty.Jesco Denzel/German Federal Government, via Associated PressFor many European officials, Mr. Biden restored the continuity of the United States’ commitment to Europe since World War II: a dependable, even indispensable, ally whose presence eased frictions among former European rivals and allowed the continent to cohere, while providing an ironclad security guarantee.In the view of Mr. Trump and his supporters, that relationship allowed Europe to shirk spending on its own defense, a resentment that fueled Mr. Trump’s threats to reduce or withdraw American commitments.“The NATO alliance is not a treaty commitment so much as a trust commitment,” said Ivo Daalder, a former American ambassador to NATO. Given the doubts Mr. Trump raised in his first term, his return as president “could mean the end of the alliance, legally or not.”In conversations with Europeans, Mr. Daalder said, “they are deeply, deeply concerned about the 2024 election and how it will impact the alliance. No matter the topic, Ukraine or NATO cohesion, it’s the only question asked.”Jan Techau, a former German defense official now with Eurasia Group, said that in the worst case, a United States that turned its back would set off “an existential problem” for Europe at a moment when both China and Russia are working avidly to divide Europeans.President Biden delivering a speech in Lithuania during meetings with NATO leaders in July. In remarks, he affirmed his support for Ukraine in the war.Doug Mills/The New York TimesAbsent American engagement, “there would be a destructive scramble for influence,” he said.For Germany, Mr. Techau said, there would be the difficult question: Should Berlin be the backbone of a collective European defense without the Americans, or would it try to make its own deal with Russia and Mr. Putin?France would most likely try to step in, having long advocated European strategic autonomy, but few believe it can provide the same kind of nuclear and security guarantee for the continent, even together with Britain, that Washington does.President Emmanuel Macron of France has made it clear that he believes a politically polarized United States, more focused on China, will inevitably reduce its commitments to Europe. He has been pushing Europeans to do more for their own defense and interests, which are not perfectly aligned with Washington’s.So far he has largely failed in that ambition and, given the war in Ukraine, has instead embraced a stronger European pillar within NATO. But even Mr. Macron would not welcome an American withdrawal from the alliance.“It’s absolutely clear that Putin intends to continue the war, at least until the American elections, and hopes for Trump,” as does China’s leader, Xi Jinping, said Thomas Gomart, the director of the French Institute of International Relations. “It could be a big shock for Europeans.”A Trump victory, Mr. Gomart said, would most likely mean less American support for Ukraine, more pressure on Kyiv to settle, and more pressure on the Europeans to deal with Mr. Putin themselves, “which we are not ready to do militarily.”Ukrainian soldiers with an American tactical vehicle during training near Kyiv, Ukraine, in March. A Trump victory could mean less U.S. support for Ukraine.Mauricio Lima for The New York TimesThere is also concern that a Trump victory could breathe new life into anti-democratic forces in Europe.Mr. Trump’s victory in 2016 gave a major boost to European populist politics, and another victory would almost surely do the same, a major worry in France, where Marine Le Pen, a far-right leader, could succeed Mr. Macron.Even in Mr. Trump’s absence, the far-right Alternative for Germany, which Germany’s domestic intelligence agency has under surveillance as a threat to the Constitution, is for the moment the country’s second-most popular party.Dominique Moïsi, a French analyst with Institut Montaigne, a research organization, said a second Trump term would be “catastrophic” for Europe’s resistance to populism.Mr. Trump is a prince of chaos, Mr. Moïsi said, and with a war raging in Europe, and China open about its ambitions, “the prospect of an America yielding to its isolationist instinct” and embracing populism “is simply scary.”Not everyone in Europe would be unwelcoming, to be sure.Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary has long celebrated ties to Mr. Trump and his wing of the Republican Party. Mr. Orban and his self-styled “illiberal democracy” is considered a sort of model by the hard right, especially his defense of what he considers traditional gender roles and of religion and his antipathy toward uncontrolled migration.Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary speaking at a Conservative Political Action Conference gathering last year in Texas. He is revered by a wing of the American political right.Emil Lippe for The New York TimesIn Poland, too, the governing Law and Justice party shares many of the same views and criticisms of established elites. It had excellent relations with Mr. Trump and succeeded in getting American troops sent to Poland.“The view in the government and in a large part of the strategic community here was that the worst didn’t happen — he didn’t sell us out to the Russians,” said Michal Baranowski of the German Marshall Fund in Warsaw. “There was a feeling that the West Europeans were freaking out a bit too much,” he said.The big question for Poland, which has been fiercely pro-Ukrainian, is what Mr. Trump and the Republicans would do about Ukraine.Mr. Baranowski said that recent discussions in Washington with officials from the conservative Heritage Foundation had given him the impression that there would be significant continuity on Ukraine.“But Trump is unpredictable to an uncomfortable degree for everyone,” he said. More

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      Theme Park’s Selective History Appeals to a New Spanish Nationalism

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      Puy du Fou España has drawn visitors with spectacular shows about Spanish history. But part of its success lies in what goes unsaid.Moving through the darkened holds of a replica of Christopher Columbus’s ship, visitors on a recent afternoon marveled at the tangle of compasses, cordage and barrels. They stumbled as the ship swang and creaked with the swell of the sea. At last, a voice shouted “Land!” and the white sands of America appeared.“Our journey has changed the world. May it be for the greater glory of God,” Columbus was then heard telling Queen Isabella I of Castile. Referring to America’s Indigenous people, he added, “I apologize in advance if iniquities or injustices are committed.”And so ends one of the shows at Puy du Fou España, a historical theme park that is all the rage in Spain today, with over a million visitors expected this year.The popularity of the park has come as a surprise in a country that has long been shy about celebrating its history. Nationalist sentiments were largely taboo after the dictatorship of Gen. Francisco Franco, who died in the 1970s.But the time that has elapsed since Franco and the recent secessionist movement in Catalonia, which threatened to fracture the country, have helped spur a resurgent nationalism in Spain. It may now give a lift to conservatives and their far-right allies when Spaniards vote in a general election on Sunday.The theme park expects more than a million visitors this year.Samuel Aranda for The New York TimesThe park is filled with hallowed symbols like the cross and the flag, and most of the shows feature conquests and glorious battles to defend the country. The more questionable aspects of Spain’s past — from the bloody conquest of America that followed Columbus’s trip to Franco’s repressive rule — do not appear in more than 10 productions.“What we’re trying to do is present a history that’s not divisive,” said Erwan de la Villéon, the head of the park, noting that historical taboos continued to run through Spanish society.But the approach has raised concerns about the history that the park is highlighting instead — pageantry that emphasizes Spain’s Catholic identity and its unity against foreign invaders — and how it may shape visitors’ views.“This is a selective history,” said Gutmaro Gómez Bravo, a historian at Madrid’s Complutense University who has visited the park twice. “You can’t or shouldn’t teach that to people. History is not gratuitous — it carries major political weight.”The park was launched in 2019 after the founders of the original Puy du Fou in France, the country’s second most-visited theme park after Disneyland Paris, decided to take their concept abroad.Historians have long criticized the French park as promoting nationalist views. It similarly glosses over some of the most painful episodes in France’s past, such as its history of colonialism, and highlights the country’s Catholic identity.The founder of the French park, Philippe de Villiers, whom Mr. de la Villéon called “a mentor” and “a genius,” is a prominent far-right politician.Erwan de la Villéon, the head of Puy du Fou España, said he had sought to find unifying aspects of Spain’s history, and it was “too soon” to mention Franco’s dictatorship.Samuel Aranda for The New York TimesMr. de la Villéon denied that the Spanish park promoted any political line. But he called supporters of Catalan independence his “enemies” and railed against the former prime minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, a Socialist who passed a memory law to honor victims of the Civil War and Franco’s repressive rule.Spain, Mr. de la Villéon said, proved an ideal place for a new park because of the country’s “great historical trajectory” of invasions and conquests. He chose to build it in Toledo, he said, because the ancient city south of Madrid once stood at the crossroads of Europe’s kingdoms.There, some 200 million euros, about $220 million, have been invested to create an impressive complex of castles, farms and medieval villages filled with terra-cotta vases and whitewashed houses with exposed beams.But it is the historical stage productions, performed in large amphitheaters, that are the big draw.“The Last Song” takes place in a rotating auditorium and follows El Cid, a knight and warlord who became Spain’s greatest medieval hero, as he fights enemies appearing successively behind large panels that open onto the semicircular stage. In “Toledo’s Dream,” the flagship evening show retracing 15 centuries of Spanish history, Columbus’s life-size ship emerges from a lake on which characters were dancing moments before.Supporters of the far-right Vox party at rally in Barcelona, Spain, in July. The party is expected to increase its vote in Sunday’s general election.Samuel Aranda for The New York TimesBoth shows received the IAAPA Brass Ring award for “Best Theater Production,” considered one of the international entertainment industry’s most prestigious prizes. On a recent afternoon, visitors were ecstatic about the experience.“Great — it’s just great. I didn’t know that history could be so appealing,” said Vicente Vidal, 65, as he exited a show featuring Visigoths fighting Romans. In the park, children could be seen playing sword-fighting, shouting, “We’ll fight for our country!”Mr. de la Villéon, who is French, said the success of the park reflected a desire among Spanish people to reclaim their past. “People want to have roots, that’s the first need that the park’s success reveals,” he said. “You come here and you think, ‘Man, it’s cool to be Spanish.’”Modern Spain has an uneasy relationship with its history because of chapters such as the Inquisition and the colonization of the Americas, said Jesús Carrobles, head of Toledo’s Royal Academy of Fine Arts and Historical Sciences, who was consulted on the park project.The Cross of Burgundy, on prominent display at the park, is a longstanding symbol of the Spanish monarchy that has also been embraced by some on the far right.Samuel Aranda for The New York Times“The park allows you to reclaim an idea of your past that you can be proud of,” Mr. Carrobles said. “A beautiful past, a past that’s worth remembering.”But it has also proved to be a selective past.The shows depict Isabella I as a visionary and a merciful queen, making no mention of her order to expel Jews during the Inquisition. The Aztecs appear once in a dance scene, but their deadly fate at the hands of the conquistadors is omitted.Perhaps most telling is the park’s treatment of the Spanish Civil War, whose legacy continues to divide the country. The conflict is only vaguely mentioned at the end of “Toledo’s Dream,” when a woman mourns her brothers who “killed each other.” The scene lasts one minute, out of a 75-minute performance, and the show ends without mentioning the subsequent four-decade dictatorship of Franco.“Too soon to talk about it,” said Mr. de la Villéon, noting that memories of Francoist Spain were still raw.Some 200 million euros, or about $220 million, have been invested in creating a medieval atmosphere.Samuel Aranda for The New York Times“It’s a very consensual show, which has glossed over the questionable aspects of Spanish history,” said Jean Canavaggio, a French specialist in Cervantes who reviewed the script of “Toledo’s Dream.” He added that the park could not have succeeded had it taken a “critical look” at Spanish history, given how politically fraught that remains.Mr. de la Villéon said that he had looked for events illustrating Spain’s unity. In Puy du Fou España, they revolve around a central element: Catholicism.Nearly every show features clerics and soldiers dedicating their fights to God. In “The Mystery of Sorbaces,” a Visigoth king converts to Catholicism as his troops fall to their knees and a church rises from underground, to the sound of emotional music.Mr. de la Villéon — who makes no secret of his faith and had a small chapel set up in the park — argued that Catholicism was “the matrix” of Spanish history.A replica of Christopher Columbus’s caravel. Catholicism is central to the park’s shows.Samuel Aranda for The New York TimesMr. Gómez Bravo, the historian, who specializes in the Civil War and Franco, said the park presented the Catholic reconquest of Muslim-ruled Spain as the foundation of Spanish unity. “This a very politically charged idea because it was promoted above all by Franco’s regime,” he said.Still, many in the Spanish park seemed to embrace the park’s mission.“Spain is a great country!” said Conchita Tejero, a woman in her 60s, who was seated with three friends at a large wooden table in a medieval-style tavern adorned with imperial flags. “This park is a way to reclaim our history.”Her friend, Esteban Garces, a supporter of the far-right Vox party, said he saw the park as a counterpoint to the “other history” that portrayed Spain as needing to make amends for its past.Exiting the park after nightfall, Mr. Garces said he had been delighted with “Toledo’s Dream.”“The true history,” he said.The idea that Spanish unity was founded on the Catholic reconquest was “charged,” one historian said, because that was the narrative promoted under Franco.Samuel Aranda for The New York Times More

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      in US Politics

      Documents seemingly leaked from Pentagon draw denials from US allies

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      A large cache of what appear to be classified Pentagon documents circulating on social media channels is becoming a growing source of anxiety for US intelligence agencies, as numerous allies have been forced into denials over the purported leaks.Half a dozen photographs of printed classified documents, mostly pertaining to the state of the Ukraine war as of the beginning of March, started to be shared on Russian Telegram channels in the middle of last week, even though research by open-source intelligence organisation Bellingcat suggests they made the rounds on niche gaming image boards several weeks earlier.On Friday, a further batch of more than 100 Pentagon documents was being shared on Twitter, seemingly revealing confidential information that US spy agencies had obtained, not just about Russia and its war of aggression against Kyiv, but also about supposed allies such as Israel and South Korea.While at least some of the images from the first leak appeared crudely doctored, the authenticity of the latest batch has not been immediately questioned. The New York Times described the leak as “a nightmare for the Five Eyes” – the intelligence alliance comprising Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States.On Sunday, the office of Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, issued a statement in which it firmly rejected a claim made in one of the leaked documents: that the Israeli foreign intelligence agency had encouraged its staff and Israeli citizens to participate in March’s wave of anti-government protests across the country.“The Mossad and its serving senior personnel have not engaged in the issue of the demonstrations at all and are dedicated to the value of service to the state that has guided the Mossad since its founding,” the statement read.The leaked document, labelled top secret, said that in February, senior Mossad officials “advocated for Mossad officials and Israeli citizens to protest the new Israeli government’s proposed judicial reforms, including several explicit calls to action that decried the Israeli government, according to signals intelligence”.While the Mossad’s purpose is not defined by law, the spy agency is not meant to wade into domestic political matters.Government officials in South Korea, meanwhile, said on Sunday they were aware that another leaked document suggested that US intelligence had spied on its allies in Seoul, and were planning to “have necessary consultations with the US side” over issues raised by the leak.At least two of the leaked Pentagon documents, based at least in part on intercepted foreign intelligence communications, describe South Korean concern over US pressure to aid Ukraine in its defensive effort against Russia, with the former foreign minister Yi Mun-hui expressing concern that artillery shells requested by Washington for its own use could ultimately end up in Kyiv’s hands.South Korea’s longstanding official policy is to not provide lethal weapons to countries at war. The South Korean presidential official, speaking to reporters, declined to respond further to questions about US spying or to confirm any details from the leaked documents.While potentially embarrassing for the Pentagon, the leaked documents also paint a flattering portrait of the US’s ability to penetrate Russian military planning, including the internal plans of the notorious Wagner mercenary group.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe leaked documents show the mercenary outfit’s ambition to operate in African states as well as Haiti, and that it had hatched plans to source arms covertly from Nato member Turkey.In early February, Wagner personnel “met with Turkish contacts to purchase weapons and equipment from Turkey”, one of the reports states, suggesting that Mali could act as a proxy buyer. Wagner is known to have set up a sizeable operation in the west African state, and one of the leaked documents claims the mercenary group has 1,645 fighters in the country.On Saturday evening, France’s defence ministry denied that there were French soldiers in Ukraine, as allegedly revealed in one of the leaked documents that circulated on social media in the middle of last week.“There are no French forces engaged in operation in Ukraine,” said a spokesperson for the minister of the armed forces, Sébastien Lecornu. “The documents cited do not come from the French armies. We do not comment on documents whose source is uncertain.”The first batch of leaked Pentagon documents contained charts and details about anticipated weapons deliveries, battalion strengths and losses on the battlefield. One slide suggested that a small contingent of less than 100 special operations personnel from Nato members France, America, Britain and Latvia were active in Ukraine.Some of the circulated documents have been obviously digitally altered to understate US estimates of Russian troops killed and Russian vehicles and fighter jets destroyed. Kyiv has said the leaked files contain “fictitious information”.The US Department of Justice said it has opened an investigation into the apparent leaks, but declined to comment further. More

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      in Elections

      Green Savior or Deadly Menace? Paris Votes on E-Scooter Ban

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      For five years, the French capital has permitted the renting of electric scooters, which have proven both popular and perilous. On Sunday, voters will decide whether to end the experiment.PARIS — Manil Hadjoudj was handing out fliers at the entrance to Sorbonne University, tirelessly repeating, “Do you care about electric scooters?” to passing students, most of whom seemed indifferent to his plea.“I care about our pension system right now,” one of them said without stopping.Mr. Hadjoudj, 18, had been hired by the three electric scooter rental companies in Paris to try to persuade young riders to help save their businesses in a vote this Sunday, when the French capital is holding a referendum on whether to ban renting the scooters within city limits.Five years after the motorized version of the two-wheeled scooters flooded the streets and sidewalks of Paris, this transportation option — whose human-powered version has long been popular with children — has become a topic of adult fury, delight and tension.City Hall calls them a threat to public safety and environmentally questionable, and wants them gone. The rental companies counter that their scooters are eco-friendly, ease getting around the city and create jobs. They see Paris as a model for good scooter practices around the world.And Parisians? They have mixed emotions.“They come in handy at night when you get out of a party and miss the last metro to get home,” said Axel Ottow, 20, stepping out of a subway station. But while he said he used them on rare occasions when no better option was available, he pointed out a commonly citied drawback: He found them “dangerous to ride.”When the mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, opened the rental scooter market to 16 operators in 2019, the city seemed to have all the characteristics of a gold mine for the companies.Its small geographic size compared to Los Angeles, Berlin or London was ideal for short-distance trips. Many bike lanes had already been installed, offering paths away from cars. And tourists, who turned out to be major clients, could get in some additional sightseeing as they zipped from the Louvre en route to L’Arc de Triomphe.In 2022, Paris recorded about 20 million trips on 15,000 rental scooters, making it one of the largest markets in the world.But at least initially, the machines created chaos, with many riders zooming wherever and however they wanted — on sidewalks, down one-way streets, weaving between cars.“It was an urban jungle,” said David Belliard, the deputy mayor in charge of transportation.Scooters from Lime, a San Francisco-based company, at a warehouse in Lisbon in February.Patricia De Melo Moreira/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe electric scooters could race up to 19 miles an hour and were parked anywhere and everywhere — sprawled across roads, sidewalks and even chucked into the Seine.In 2019, a rider was hit by a van and killed, becoming the first but far from the last rental scooter fatality in the city.Alarmed, the city drafted rules. Scooters were deemed motorized vehicles and forbidden to travel on sidewalks. Their maximum speed was reduced to about 12 miles an hour and even lower near schools, and specific parking spaces were created. The city introduced a fine of 135 euros, or $147, for riding on sidewalks or carrying a cuddling passenger on the vehicles meant for one, which had become a romantic Parisian cliché.In 2020, the city narrowed the number of operators to three: the San Francisco-based company Lime, the Dutch start-up Dott and Tier, a German start-up.“Since that initial period of chaos, we have seen an incredible amount of improvement in our service,” said Erwann Le Page, a spokesman for Tier, who said the company provided scooters in towns and cities across France, including other cities like Lyon and Bordeaux. Operators say that they made the vehicles heavier to increase stability and that 96 percent of the machines are now parked where they should be.But even with all the rule changes, the number of fatal accidents has increased along with scooters’ popularity.In 2021, 24 people were killed in France while riding a personal or rental scooter or other motorized devices like hoverboards and gyropods, and 413 were seriously injured, according to figures provided by the State Road Safety Department. Last year, 34 people died and 570 were seriously injured in the country. Accidents on scooters have become “a major health problem,” the French National Academy of Medicine said.“Scooters have an image of lightness and carelessness, but they also cause drama and death,” said Arnaud Kielbasa, who set up an association in 2019 for scooter victims after someone riding one knocked down his wife, who had been carrying their 7-week-old baby girl, who was hospitalized with a concussion.With 20 million trips taken last year, however, it’s obvious that a huge number of riders accept the danger. For scooter riders, helmets are recommended but not required by law, and the National Academy of Medicine has said that nationally, “in serious crashes, helmets were not worn nine out of 10 times.”For the employees of the scooter companies, their livelihood is also on the line in Sunday’s vote.“I don’t know what I’ll do next if the company has no choice but to fire me,” said Salifou Kaba, 26, a Tier employee whose job is to ride around Paris on an electric cargo bike to change the scooters’ batteries. The job has brought him a better place to live, bank loan approvals and stability, he said. “That’s why I’m afraid of Sunday’s results,” Mr. Kaba said.An official from the Paris mayor’s office moving electric scooters away from car parking spaces along a Paris street in 2019.Olivier Morin/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe companies insist that their scooters, which run on electrically charged batteries, offer a low-carbon alternative to cars, which should, they say, make them attractive to Paris and its mayor, who has championed green initiatives.The vehicles “helped reduce pollution in about 600 cities in the world, including 100 in France,” said Mr. Le Page, pointing to a city-sponsored study that showed that 19 percent of scooter trips would have otherwise been made by car.That same study, however, found that more than three-quarters of the users would have otherwise walked, taken public transportation or biked if scooters were not an option.“Sure, scooters don’t emit any pollution like a car,” countered Mr. Belliard, a member of France’s Green party. “But a big majority would have used modes of transportation that are already decarbonized.”Nationwide, more than 750,000 electric scooters were sold in 2022, after a record 900,000 in 2021, according to the Federation of Micro-Mobility Professionals, which includes scooter distributors and retailers. And the mayor of Lyon, France’s third largest city, has just agreed to a four-year extension of its contract with Tier and Dott.But Paris’s City Hall, once excited to bring the new transportation choice to the French capital, is now keen to see it gone. Instead of banning the scooters outright, Ms. Hidalgo and her deputies decided to let the public vote in the referendum. A recent poll showed that 70 percent would vote against keeping them.If Tier, Lime and Dott lose Sunday’s vote, their contracts with the city will not be renewed, and the scooters’ zigzagging presence in Paris will be gone by the end of August.The operators have mounted a campaign in favor of keeping the scooters. They have criticized the fact that online voting — rare in France — was not allowed, arguing that its absence deters younger voters from participating. They have also complained that the geographic boundaries of who can vote were too restrictive, excluding people in the suburbs.In the week before the vote, the social network TikTok was buzzing with messages using the hashtag “sauvetatrott” (“save your scooter”), and Parisian social influencers have expounded on the importance of saving the “most romantic thing to do in Paris” or the only transportation service that’s “not affected by national strikes.”But many Parisians would find their ban a relief.“I don’t call them scooters, I call them garbage,” said Olivier Guntzberger, 45, an electronics salesman. Outside his storefront on a narrow street near the Champs-Élysées, 20 scooters were piled in a parking space. “I’m not going to cry over them,” he said.Catherine Porter More

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      Macron Appears Ready to Tough Out France’s Pension Crisis

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      Amid protests in the streets and in Parliament, the French leader shows no sign of scrapping a law that raises the retirement age.PARIS — President Emmanuel Macron’s re-election program last year was short on detail. His mind seemed elsewhere, chiefly on the war in Ukraine. But on one thing he was clear: He would raise the retirement age in France to 65 from 62.“You will have to work progressively more,” he said during a debate in April 2022 with the extreme-right candidate, Marine Le Pen. She attacked the idea as “an absolutely unbearable injustice” that would condemn French people to retirement “when they are no longer able to enjoy it.”France heard both candidates. Soon after, Mr. Macron was re-elected with 58.55 percent of the vote to Ms. Le Pen’s 41.45 percent. It was a clear victory, and it was clear what Mr. Macron would do on the question of pensions.Yet his ramming the overhaul through Parliament last week without a full vote on the bill itself culminated in turmoil, mayhem on the streets and two failed no-confidence votes against his government on Monday, even as polls have consistently shown about 65 percent of French people are opposed to raising the retirement age.Had they not heard him? Had they changed their minds? Had circumstances changed? Perhaps the answer lies, above all, in the nature of Mr. Macron’s victory, as he himself acknowledged on election night last year.Looking somber, speaking in an uncharacteristically flat monotone, Mr. Macron told a crowd of supporters in Paris: “I also know that a number of our compatriots voted for me today not to support the ideas that I uphold, but to block the extreme right. I want to thank them and say that I am aware that I have obligations toward them in the years to come.”“Those ‘obligations’ could only be a promise to negotiate on major reforms,” Nicole Bacharan, a social scientist, said on Tuesday. “He did not negotiate, even with moderate union leaders. What I see now is Macron’s complete disconnection from the country.”Marine Le Pen, center, of the far-right National Rally party, says the pension plan would condemn French people to retirement “when they are no longer able to enjoy it.”Thomas Samson/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesOpposition parties on both the left and the right have vowed to file challenges against the pension law before the Constitutional Council, which reviews legislation to ensure it complies with the French Constitution.“The goal,” said Thomas Ménagé of Ms. Le Pen’s National Rally party, “is to ensure that this text falls into the dustbin of history.”But the chances of that appear remote.After a long silence, Mr. Macron is set to address the turmoil on Wednesday. He will try to conciliate; he will, according to officials close to him, portray the current standoff as a battle between democratic institutions and the chaos of the street, orchestrated by the extreme left and slyly encouraged by the extreme right. He has decided to stick with his current government, led by Élisabeth Borne, the prime minister, and he will not dissolve Parliament or call new elections, they say.In short, it seems Mr. Macron has decided to tough out the crisis, perhaps offering some blandishments on improving vocational high schools and broader on-the-job training. But certainly no apology appears to be forthcoming for using a legal tool, Article 49.3 of the Constitution, to avoid a full parliamentary vote on a change that has split the country. (Only the Senate, the upper house, voted to pass the bill this month.)This approach appears consistent with Mr. Macron’s chosen tactics on the pension overhaul. Since the debate with Ms. Le Pen 11 months ago, inflation has risen, energy prices have gone up, and the pressures, particularly on the poorer sectors of French society, have grown.French lawmakers held up protest placards after the result of the first no-confidence motion against the French government at the National Assembly on Monday.Gonzalo Fuentes/ReutersYet, while he has made some concessions, including setting the new retirement age at 64 rather than 65, Mr. Macron has remained remote from the rolling anger. Most conspicuously, and to many inexplicably, after the government consulted extensively with unions in the run-up to January, Mr. Macron has refused to negotiate with the powerful moderate union leader Laurent Berger, who had supported Mr. Macron’s earlier attempt at pension changes in 2019 but opposes him now.“Macron knows the economy better than he knows political psychology,” said Alain Duhamel, a political scientist. “And today, what you have is a generalized fury.”A large number of Macron voters, it is now clear, never wanted the retirement age raised. They heard Mr. Macron during the debate with Ms. Le Pen. They just did not loathe his idea enough to vote for a nationalist, anti-immigrant ideologue whose party was financed in part by Russian loans.Mr. Macron is adept at playing on such contradictions and divisions. Because his presidential term is limited, he is freer to do as he pleases. He knows three things: He will not be a candidate for re-election in 2027 because a third consecutive term is not permitted; the opposition in Parliament is strong but irreconcilably divided between the far left and extreme right; and there is a large, silent slice of French society that supports his pension overhaul.All this gives him room to maneuver even in his current difficult situation.When Mr. Macron opted last week for the 49.3 and the avoidance of a parliamentary vote, he explained his decision this way: “I consider that in the current state of affairs the financial and economic risks are too great.”Protesters in Nantes, in western France, on Tuesday.Loic Venance/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesOn the face of it, speaking about risks to financial markets while pushing through an overhaul deeply resented by blue-collar and working-class French people seemed politically gauche. It appeared especially so at a moment when Mr. Macron was turning away from the full parliamentary vote his government had unanimously said it wanted.“Saying what he said about finance at that moment, in that context, was just dynamite,” said Ms. Bacharan.It was also an unmistakable wink to the powerful French private sector — with its world-class companies like LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton — and to the many affluent and middle-class French people who do not like the growing piles of uncollected garbage or the protests in the streets, and who view retirement at 62 as an unsustainable anomaly in a Europe where the retirement age has generally risen to 65 or higher.If Mr. Macron has cards to play, and perhaps broader support than is evident as protesters hurl insults at him day after day, his very disconnection may make it hard for him to judge the country’s mood.Last week, Aurore Bergé, the leader of Mr. Macron’s Renaissance party in Parliament, wrote to Gérald Darmanin, the interior minister, to request police protection for lawmakers.“I refuse to see representatives from my group, or any national lawmaker, afraid to express themselves, or to vote freely, because they are afraid of reprisals,” she said.It was a measure of the violent mood in France.“If we have had 15 Constitutions over the past two centuries, that means there have been 14 revolutions of various kinds,” Mr. Duhamel said. “There is an eruptive side to France that one should not ignore.”The National Assembly in Paris. Opposition parties on the left and the right have vowed to file challenges against the pension law. Joel Saget/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesAurelien Breeden More

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      Macron Faces an Angry France Alone

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      President Emmanuel Macron saw his decision to push through a change in the retirement age as necessary, but the price may be high.PARIS — “We have a president who makes use of a permanent coup d’état.” That was the verdict of Olivier Faure, the leader of the French Socialist Party, after President Emmanuel Macron rammed through a bill raising the retirement age in France to 64 from 62 without a full parliamentary vote this past week.In fact, Mr. Macron’s use of the “nuclear option,” as the France 24 TV network described it, was entirely legal under the French Constitution, crafted in 1958 for Charles de Gaulle and reflecting the general’s strong view that power should be centered in the president’s office, not among feuding lawmakers.But legality is one thing and legitimacy another. Mr. Macron may see his decision as necessary to cement his legacy as the leader who left France prepared to face the rest of the 21st century. But to many French people it looked like presidential diktat, a blot on his reputation and a blow to French democracy.Parliament has responded with two motions of no confidence in Mr. Macron’s government. They are unlikely to be upheld when the lawmakers vote on them next week because of political divisions in the opposition, but are the expression of a deep anger.Six years into his presidency, surrounded by brilliant technocrats, Mr. Macron cuts a lonely figure, his lofty silence conspicuous at this moment of turmoil.“He has managed to antagonize everyone by occupying the whole of the center,” said Jacques Rupnik, a political scientist. “Macron’s attitude seems to be: After me, the deluge.”This isolation was evident as two months of protests and strikes that left Paris strewn with garbage culminated on Thursday in the sudden panic of a government that had believed the pension vote was a slam dunk. Suddenly, the emperor’s doubts were exposed.Mr. Macron thought he could count on the center-right Republicans to vote for his plan in the National Assembly, Parliament’s lower house. Two of the most powerful members of his government — Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire and Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin — came from that party. The Republicans had advocated retirement even later, at 65.Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne, bottom left, with lawmakers at the National Assembly on Thursday. If the government falls in a no-confidence vote, she will no longer be prime minister.Alain Jocard/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesYet out of some mixture of political calculation in light of the waves of protest and spite toward the man who had undermined their party by building a new movement of the center, they began to desert Mr. Macron.Having his retirement overhaul fail was one risk that even Macron the risk taker could not take. He opted for a measure, known as the 49.3 after the relevant article of the Constitution, that allows certain bills to be passed without a vote. France’s retirement age will rise to 64, more in line with its European partners, unless the no-confidence motion passes.But what would have looked like a defining victory for Mr. Macron, even if the parliamentary vote in favor had been narrow, now looks like a Pyrrhic victory.Four more years in power stretch ahead of Mr. Macron, with “Mr. 49.3” stamped on his forehead. He made the French dream when he was elected at age 39 in 2017; how he can do so again is unclear.“The idea that we are not in a democracy has grown. It’s out there all the time on social media, part conspiracy theory, part expression of a deep anxiety,” said Nicolas Tenzer, an author who teaches political science at Sciences Po university. “And, of course, what Macron just did feeds that.”The government’s spokesman is Olivier Véran, who is also minister delegate for democratic renewal. There is a reason for that august title: a widespread belief that over the six years of the Macron presidency, French democracy has eroded.After the Yellow Vest protest movement erupted in 2018 over an increase in gas prices but also an elitism that Mr. Macron seemed to personify, the president went on a “listening tour.” It was an attempt to get closer to working people of whom he had seemed dismissive.Now, almost one year into his second term, that outreach seems distant. Mr. Macron scarcely laid the groundwork for his pension measure even though he knew well that it would touch a deep French nerve at a time of economic hardship. His push for later retirement was top-down, expedited at every turn and, in the end, ruthless.Outside the National Assembly, French Parliament’s lower house, on Friday. Mr. Macron thought he could count on center-right Republicans there to vote for his plan, but they began to desert him.Geoffroy Van Der Hasselt/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe case for the overhaul was strong. It was not only to Mr. Macron that retirement at 62 looked untenable as lives grew longer. The math, over the longer term at least, simply does not add up in a system where the ratio of active workers to the retirees they are supporting through their payroll taxes keeps dropping.But in an anxious France, with many people struggling to pay their bills and unsure of their futures, Mr. Macron could not make the argument. In fact, he hardly seemed to try.Of course, the French attitude to a mighty presidency is notoriously ambiguous. On the one hand, the near-monarchical office seems to satisfy some French yearning for an all-powerful state — it was a French king, Louis XIV, who is said to have declared that the state was none other than himself. On the other, the presidency is resented for the extent of its authority.Mr. Macron seemed to capture this when he told his cabinet on Thursday, “Among you, I am not the one who risks his place or his seat.” If the government does fall in a vote of censure, Élisabeth Borne will no longer be prime minister, but Mr. Macron will still be president until 2027.“A permanent coup d’état,” Mr. Faure’s phrase, was also the title of a book that François Mitterrand wrote to describe the presidency of de Gaulle. That was before Mr. Mitterrand became president himself and in time came to enjoy all the pomp and power of his office. Mr. Macron has proved no more impervious to the temptations of the presidency than his predecessors.Protesters at a train station in Bordeaux, France, on Friday. Demonstrations and strikes over the pension bill have gone on for two months and continued after Mr. Macron’s decision to avoid a full vote.Philippe Lopez/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBut times change, social hierarchies fall, and Mr. Macron’s exercise of his authority has stirred a strong resentment in a flatter French society at a moment of war-induced tension in Europe.“There is a rejection of the person,” Mr. Tenzer said. The daily newspaper Le Monde noted in an editorial that Mr. Macron ran the risk of “fostering a persistent bitterness, or even igniting sparks of violence.”In a way, Mr. Macron is the victim of his own remarkable success. Such are his political gifts that he has been elected to two terms in office — no French president had done this in two decades — and effectively destroyed the two political pillars of postwar France: the Socialist Party and the Gaullists.So he is resented by the center left and center right, even as he is loathed by the far left and the far right.Now in his final term, he must walk a lonely road. He has no obvious successor, and his Renaissance party is little more than a vehicle for his talents. This is the “deluge” of which Mr. Rupnik spoke: a vast political void looming in 2027.If Marine Le Pen of the far right is not to fill it, Mr. Macron the reformist must deliver the resilient, vibrant France for which he believes his much-contested reform was an essential foundation.A protester shot a firework at police officers in Paris on Friday.Julien De Rosa/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesAurelien Breeden More

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      What’s Next for Opponents of Macron’s Retirement Plan?

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      Angry protesters lit small fires and clashed with police clad in riot gear at the Place de la Concorde in central Paris on Thursday after President Emmanuel Macron pushed his pension reform bill through Parliament without a vote.Several thousand people had spontaneously gathered there earlier in the day, after the government’s decision was announced, to demonstrate across the Seine River from the National Assembly, the lower house of Parliament.While the gathering was mostly peaceful throughout the afternoon, the situation took a more violent turn as night fell over the French capital and the police moved in to clear out the Place de la Concorde, a major square in Paris with a famed obelisk in the middle, not far from luxury hotels, the Tuileries gardens and the U.S. Embassy.Protesters with covered faces threw cobblestones torn from the pavement at the police, who responded with tear gas and water cannons as they slowly pushed the diminishing crowds into surrounding streets. Some protesters set fire to wood construction fencing and heaps of trash, which has gone uncollected in many parts of Paris over the past week because of an ongoing strike by garbage workers.Protesters with covered faces throwing objects at the police on Place de la Concorde in Paris, on Thursday.Alain Jocard/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesFrench police officers responding to clashes that erupted at Place de la Concorde.Yoan Valat/EPA, via ShutterstockThe scene at the Place de la Concorde earlier in the day was much more jovial, but also seemed to embody how fuzzy the next stage of the battle may be for opponents of President Emmanuel Macron’s pension overhaul.Thousands of protesters, along with some leftist legislators, gathered on the plaza, in the center of a giant traffic circle in the heart of the French capital. But the crowd was disorganized: Some people tried to generate momentum for a march on the nearby National Assembly, to no avail, while others chanted slogans or just stood by.Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the prominent leftist politician, arrived and then quickly disappeared.Hours after Mr. Macron’s decision to push through his plan to raise the retirement age without putting it to a vote in the National Assembly, many in the crowd expressed anger and vowed to continue fighting a measure that they say erodes a cherished part of France’s social safety net.“We will do spontaneous protests across France,” said Isabelle Mollaret, 47, a children’s librarian who held a sign that read, “Macron, you aren’t the boss. We will fight him!”Catherine Porter/The New York TimesThe protest on the Place de la Concorde already has all the hallmarks of a French demonstration. Union flags and balloons are up. Loudspeakers are blaring music. And, yes, a union truck is selling jambon-beurre sandwiches.Constant Meheut/The New York TimesUnion leaders said earlier on Thursday that they would soon call for more demonstrations, trying to extend what have already been eight nationwide mobilizations against the pension plan in the last two months.With an absence of clear organization, it was unclear whether the protests would grow into the kind of unbridled social unrest that France has sometimes experienced — such as the Yellow Vest movement in 2018 and 2019 — or would fizzle.But anger among opponents of the pension plan was growing. In the plaza, where union flags and balloons flew and music blared from loudspeakers, many people said they were committed to continue protesting against the plan — and against a government they see as having shown contempt for them.“We will do spontaneous protests across France,” said Isabelle Mollaret, 47, a children’s librarian who held a sign that read, “Macron, you aren’t the boss.” She added, “We will fight him!”Students protesting against the government’s plan to raise the retirement age to 64, in Paris, on Thursday.Lewis Joly/Associated PressA group of students chanted against Mr. Macron, calling him “president of the business bosses.” If students become deeply involved in the protest movement, that could be a bad sign for Mr. Macron’s government. In 2006, widespread student protests against a law introducing a youth jobs contract forced the government to backtrack and repeal the law — exactly what protesters are aiming for now.Still, the feeling on the plaza was one of a festival, not an angry protest. A woman handed out chocolate. Students sang. A group of women from Attac, a French anti-globalization movement, known as the Rosies, changed the lyrics of Gloria Gaynor’s “I Will Survive” to reflect an anti-Macron sentiment and led the crowd in a choreographed dance.“We are relieved because we know the fight will continue,” said Lou Chesne, 36, an energy-efficiency researcher and one of the dancers.He noted that the government hadn’t been able to collect enough votes in the Legislative Assembly to pass their law, and instead had to shoehorn it through with a special constitutional tool.“They are isolated,” Mr. Chesne said. More