Welfare vs. warfare: France’s political parties divided over cash for defense 

PARIS — Will France’s defense-spending boost threaten the country’s beloved welfare state? 

French President Emmanuel Macron has sought to build up public approval on spending more on the French military to face the threat posed by Russia as the United States disengages from Europe. But, crucially, he hasn’t explained where the money will come from. 

Macron merely set a red line: Taxes, he said, should not be raised to fund the spending boost. Those comments have triggered fears among opposition parties and unions that social spending will be sacrificed on the altar of the defense effort, and that warmongering will be used as a pretext to push through unpopular austerity measures. 

While the French president has great power over defense policy, the legislature controls the purse strings — and Macron has no majority there.

There’s some cross-party consensus on raising defense spending. But who should contribute what is sure to become a heated debate, and in France’s fractured parliament, where no single party or coalition holds a majority of seats, it risks ending in deadlock.

“We won’t jump into the war-economy discourse that holds everything else in abeyance. It’s a temptation that will exist,” said an influential lawmaker in the Socialist group, a key partner for the center-right government in budget negotiations.

One option to swiftly boost military spending would be to reopen this year’s budget and adjust it.

But the current budget — which contained €53 billion in spending cuts and tax hikes aimed at reducing France’s soaring deficit, which reached 6.2 percent of gross domestic product in 2024 — took months to pass through France’s legislature and cost a prime minister his job.

Guns or butter 

France currently spends 2.1 percent of its GDP on its military annually — and Macron wants to get that figure to more than 3 percent. According to estimates by French Armed Forces Minister Sébastien Lecornu, France’s military would ideally need a yearly budget of just under €100 billion — which would amount to finding about €30 billion more each year compared to what was previously foreseen by the military planning law passed in 2023.

All European countries are massively ramping up defense spending, and all are facing similar issues on where to find the cash to do so.

In January, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte called on European nations to redirect “a small fraction” of spending on pensions, health and social security to the military. But he’s mostly faced pushback so far, with countries such as Italy and even those closer to Russia like Lithuania saying no. 

Aggressively going after the welfare state could spark fireworks in France, where Macron’s past attempts to tweak the country’s social safety nets, most notably on pensions, were met with mass protests and strikes.

Laurent Jacobelli, a lawmaker from the far-right National Rally who works on defense policy, accused Macron of “pushing cynicism to the point of using [the Ukraine war] tragedy to justify future social destructions and abysmal deficits.” The National Rally’s presidential candidate, Marine Le Pen, told Le Figaro that she is concerned Macron will increase the French debt to fund his defense ambitions.

France’s left-wing opposition parties and trade unions are also worried. They would rather see tax increases on the rich and large corporations than a reduction in other budget lines.

“We have to stop the psychosis that is looking to be installed in the minds of workers, installing the idea that we have to cut back on our social rights to finance military spending,” Sophie Binet, the secretary-general of the powerful CGT union, told TV station France 2.  

Mixed signals 

Even within the government, the debate doesn’t appear to be settled.

Prime Minister François Bayrou said Thursday he would give “in the coming days” more indication about the French government’s plans to address military spending.

“Taking care of the country’s defense is an absolute priority, but we can’t ignore all the other problems,” he said on Friday. The prime minister added that finding a solution on how to fund military expenditure might take up to two months.

In the meantime, cabinet members have delivered conflicting messages. 

Economy Minister Eric Lombard floated increasing taxes on the rich and ruled out cutting social spending, while Europe Minister Benjamin Haddad slammed proposals to raise taxes and said “working more” could offer the budgetary “room for maneuver” which is needed. Lecornu said the state should refocus on what he sees as its core missions — “defense, police, justice” — to save money.

Bayrou and Lombard also floated a national loan Friday.

Cédric Perrin, a lawmaker from the conservative Les Républicains party and the president of the Senate’s defense and foreign affairs committee, said money could be found by limiting waste in public spending.

“We have to tell the French the truth. Reforms are necessary,” Perrin told the Association of Defense Journalists, of which POLITICO is a member, on Friday.

“I’m not saying we need to overhaul the social model, but there is money to be found in the current mismanagement,” he added.