PARIS — French President Emmanuel Macron was given red-carpet treatment by his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping, during last week's state visit to China. After Xi’s visit to Moscow last month and the groundbreaking announcement on March 10 of China’s role in brokering a deal between Iran and Saudi Arabia, France and Europe are taking stock in the reshuffling array of international relations.

Macron’s remarks, in a rather Charles de Gaulle manner, on the necessity for Europe to keep a matter of distance with US policy worldwide — considering the US an ally though not a master — raised eyebrows in the most pro-American European circles.

Though Beijing — and Moscow for that matter — regularly try to break the NATO alliance of democracies that NATO, Macron’s move was also an attempt of sorts to underline the backhanded dimension of Xi’s support to Putin, from the Ukraine war to the Middle East.  

One of the key outcomes of Xi’s Moscow visit was that China made it clear it would not let Moscow use nuclear weapons — if only because it would hurt Beijing's international trade, as embodied in the Belt and Road Initiative. And if Putin is deprived of any capacity of nuclear blackmail by Xi’s veto, he is poised not to win the Ukraine war.