The Economist - USA (2022-05-21)

50 Europe The Economist May 21st 2022

intoUkraineinusefulquantities,witha lot

more to come. On May 10th America’s

House of Representatives approved a

$40bn aid package for Ukraine which,

onceapprovedbytheSenatewhereitis

stillpending,willbringthecumulativeto­

talofAmericansupportto$54bn.

Ukrainianforcesarecapableof“tactical

manoeuvres”,liketheoperationsaround

Kharkiv,saysa Westernofficial.Butscaling

thisupalonga frontwhichstretcheshun­

dredsofkilometresinDonbasalone,and

1,300kmintotal—inotherwords,turning

counter­attacksintoa full­blowncounter­

offensive—will be a challenge. Russia’s

woesinUkrainehaveservedasa reminder

thatwartendstofavourthedefender.If

Ukraineweretoattackdug­inRussianpo­

sitions,itwouldfindithardergoing.For

exactlythatreason,RussianforcesinKher­

son,MykolaivandZaporizhiaprovincesin

southern Ukraine have been digging

trenchesandbuildingconcretefortifica­

tions,accordingtotheInstitutefortheStu­

dyofWar,a think­tank.

“Overall,thebattleisfinelybalanced,”

saystheofficial.“Ukrainianpersonnelare

highlymotivatedandhighlyexperienced,

and[deployed] insufficientnumbersto

holdadefensiveline—butperhapsdon’t

have the capabilities they might need.”

Westernweaponryhasbeenabundant,but

notdecisive,sofaratleast.Russianforces,

despite their heavy losses and tactical

shortcomings, still “significantly over­

matchthe Ukrainiansin terms oftheir

overall capability”.That assessmentwas

echoedonMay10thbyLieutenant­General

ScottBerrier, thehead ofAmerica’sDe­

fenceIntelligenceAgency.“TheRussians

aren’twinningandtheUkrainiansaren’t

winning,”hesaid.“We’reata bitofa stale­

matehere.”Ukrainiansreceivesuchpro­

nouncementswithscepticism.Theyhave

beenunderestimatedbefore.n

France’snewprimeminister

First Borne

I

n 2022 itoughttobeunremarkable for a

woman  to  be  appointed  to  run  a  Euro­

pean  government.  Yet  the  nomination  on

May 16th of Elisabeth Borne as prime min­

ister  of  France  was  anything  but.  It  is  the

first time in 30 years that a woman has held

the  post,  and  only  the  second  time  ever.

The previous one, Edith Cresson, appoint­

ed  by  François  Mitterrand,  did  not  last  a

year in the job. As Ms Borne took over from

Jean Castex on the evening of her nomina­

tion,shededicatedherappointment to “all

the  little  girls”  in  France,  telling  them  to

“follow your dreams”.

Such  folksy  utterances  are  atypical  of

Ms  Borne.  An  engineer  by  training,  and  a

career technocrat, the 61­year­old is better

known  as  a  no­nonsense  details  person

who gets on with the job. Ahead of France’s

parliamentary  elections  on  June  12th  and

19th, her immediate task will be to help win

another majority for the centrist grouping

led by President Emmanuel Macron, and to

draw  up  plans  to  ease  the  soaring  cost  of

living. An even trickier challenge will be to

negotiate the pension reform that Mr Mac­

ron has promised for his second term, in­

cluding a controversial rise in the pension

age from 62 to 64 or 65.

Mr Macron has put her in the job in part

because Ms Borne has shown that she can

be  an  efficient  negotiator.  In  a  previous

post as his transport minister, and as a for­

mer head of the Paris metro, she brought in

a reform of the sncf national railways that

included  opening  passenger  transport  to

competition and ending special protected

contracts  for  newly  recruited  railway

workers. She may not have left the unions

with warm, fuzzy feelings, but she got the

reform  through.  Employment  will  also  be

near  the  top  of  her  in­tray.  Serving  as  Mr

Macron’s  labour  minister,  Ms  Borne  ex­

panded apprenticeships and reformed the

rules  for  unemployment  benefits.  Having

already  brought  joblessness  down  from

9.2%  to  7.1%,  Mr  Macron  has  promised  to

bring about full employment by the end of

his second term.

Ms  Borne’s  nomination  also  brings  a

degree  of  political  balance  to  the  top  of

France’s government. Mr Macron was first

elected  in  2017  to  govern  “neither  on  the

left  nor  the  right”.  Yet  his  two  previous

prime ministers, Edouard Philippe and Mr

Castex,  both  came  from  the  centre­right.

Insofar as Ms Borne hails from the left, it is

as  a  technocrat,  not  a  politician.  Like

Georges  Pompidou  and  Raymond  Barre

when they were appointed in the 1960s and

1970s,  she  has  never  held  elected  office,

though she is running for parliament next

month  in  Normandy.  She  has  only  the

loosest  of  links  to  the  now­moribund  So­

cialist Party. Indeed, Jean­Luc Mélenchon,

the  hard­left  leader,  dismissed  the  notion

that Ms Borne is from the left as “trickery”. 

Still,  under  the  French  system,  where

ministers pick civil servants to form a cabi-

netof staff, Ms Borne has chosen to build a

career  on  the  left.  Before  joining  Mr  Mac­

ron in 2017 she worked for a succession of

Socialist leaders. Her jobs included a spell

as chief of staff to Ségolène Royal, a former

environment  minister,  and  a  stint  in

charge  of  urban  planning  for  Bertrand

Delanoë, a former mayor of Paris. 

Besides pension reform, Ms Borne is al­

so likely to get the job of overseeing “green

planning”.  During  the  presidential  cam­

paign, Mr Macron promised that this con­

cept would underpin all policymaking dur­

ing  his  second  term.  This  idea  remains

vague, but the principle seems to be to ap­

point  a  powerful  environment  minister

under  Ms  Borne  to  implement  France’s

transition to a greener economy. This may

be  Julien  Denormandie,  a  close  ally  of  Mr

Macron and his outgoing farm minister.

Ms Borne’s is a decidedly unshowy ap­

pointment, and comes after three weeks of

dithering by the re­elected Mr Macron. Nor

does  she  exude  the  provincial  warmth  of

the  south­western  Mr  Castex.  Yet  for  all

their  differences  in  style  and  tempera­

ment, the austere Ms Borne and the rugby­

loving Mr Castex share one attribute essen­

tial to success under Mr Macron: neither of

them  steals  the  limelight  from  the  presi­

dent.  And  shouldtheparliamentary  elec­

tion not turn outasplanned, she could be

gone in a month.n

P ARIS

Macron nods to the left, sort of

From the TGV to the top

Germany

Another blow for

Mr Scholz

T

he election-night party on May 15th

in a tent in the garden of the headquar­

ters  of  the  Christian  Democratic  Party

(cdu)  in  Düsseldorf,  the  capital  of  North

Rhine­Westphalia (nrw), got so noisy that

the office of public order had to intervene

after locals complained. cdumembers cel­

ebrated their unexpectedly strong showing

at the state’s election with 500 litres of beer

and very loud chanting. Hendrik Wüst, the

usually  stiff  Westphalian  who  is  the  in­

B ERLIN

An upset in North Rhine-Westphalia

unsettles the national ruling coalition