General de Villiers recounts his “muscular” exchanges with his Russian counterpart Guerassimov

A conflictive relationship, long before the start of the war in Ukraine. Invited this Tuesday on BFMTV, General Pierre de Villiers, Chief of the Defense Staff between 2014 and 2017, was asked about the relations he had with his Russian counterparts when he held this prestigious military position.

First “muscular” date

Among the personalities cited during this interview, Valeri Guerassimov, an army general who more or less had the same career as him, within the Russian army. “I had several periods. It turns out that I was a Major General of the Armed Forces (from 2010 to 2014, editor’s note) at the same time as General Guerassimov, ”he recalls.

The first meeting between the two leaders thus occurs while both hold this position. It is a “meeting that he would describe as muscular”, summarizes Pierre de Villiers.

“I don’t like being stepped on. When you are chief of staff of the French army, you embody your soldiers somewhere, but also your country,” he stresses.

“The Balance of Power, The Real”

A few years later, in 2015, the two soldiers rose through the ranks and became chiefs of staff of their respective armies. A new meeting is planned in Moscow, on the sidelines of the war in Syria, “for cooperation”, although the tension between the countries is already high. “Our ships were very close to each other, the submarines, the planes,” recalls Pierre de Villiers.

“What I found was that they only recognized one thing, the balance of power. Not the language element, not the burst of voice, the balance of power, the real one,” she assures.

During these various meetings, Pierre de Villiers was able to personally observe the animosity of his Russian counterpart, as well as the use, already, of arguments taken up in recent months to justify the invasion of Ukraine.

“He constantly spoke to me about NATO, about the threat of the West against Russia with an aggressiveness that I could not admit. When you’re between two chiefs of staff, you can talk face to face. each one represents our country, of course, but we don’t have to be so aggressive,” he concludes.