Is Emmanuel Macron turning into Emperor Napoleon III? Not the great Napoleon who conquered Europe and was eventually defeated by a British-led coalition at Waterloo and exiled to Saint Helena in the south Atlantic. But his lesser nephew, whose obsession with his uncle’s glory drove him to flatulent demagoguery at home, grandiose schemes abroad and humiliating defeat at the hands of the Prussians in 1870.
Under the last monarch of France, the country descended into the revolutionary Commune, was amputated of Alsace-Lorraine and prostrated before a united and all-powerful Germany. The lesser Napoleon was eventually deposed, vilified and outlawed to Chislehurst, outside London. It was to Napoleon III that Karl Marx was referring in his famous quote:
‘History repeats itself: the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce.’
Macron seems determined to ensure history repeats itself
Of course Emmanuel Macron has no glorious uncle who once ruled France. But he does have a spiritual one, whom he frequently seeks to ape: Charles de Gaulle.
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