Emmanuel Macron to relaunch French military service

President Emmanuel Macron announced plans to reintroduce military service for young people on a voluntary basis, as France joins other European nations in seeking to bolster its defence capabilities in the face of threats from Russia.

On a visit to a military base near Grenoble in south-east France on Thursday, Macron outlined plans to enable more young men and women to join the military from the summer of 2026. An initial cohort of 3,000 volunteers, mostly aged 18 and 19, will rise to 10,000 in 2030 and 50,000 in 2035 under the plans.

“In this uncertain world where might makes right . . . our nation has no right to be afraid, to panic, to be unprepared or to be divided,” he said in a speech in front of military personnel.

“Fear, moreover, never avoids danger. The only way to avoid it is to be prepared.”

France suspended obligatory national military service in 1997 under Jacques Chirac after the end of the cold war. But several other European nations including Germany have moved recently to boost military numbers and put in place mechanisms for potential conscription.

Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, other European nations have faced increasing threats from Moscow in the form of drone incursions in their airspace, cyber attacks, suspected tampering with undersea cables and election interference.

Macron said the national service would have three aims: to “reinforce the pact between our nation and our armies”, to strengthen France’s “capacity for resistance” and to improve the training of young French people.

While the service would be voluntary, he added that in a “moment of major crisis”, parliament would reserve the right to make it obligatory.

Macron has sought to bolster France’s defence potential in recent years and had raised the prospect of voluntary service in front of high-ranking military officials ahead of the Bastille Day parades in July, when he warned of the “enduring threat” from Russia.

France already has ambitions to increase the size of its 200,000-strong active armed forces to 210,000 by 2030, and to double the number of reservists from about 40,000 to 80,000 over the same period.

The latest initiative would help support these aims. Volunteers would serve for 10 months, with one month of training, and would learn how to handle weapons and military drills. They would then join a military unit for nine months, performing the same work as other soldiers on national territory.

Macron said the measures would cost more than €2bn.

This year, Germany made plans to reintroduce military service in an attempt to raise the size of the military from 182,000 to as much as 260,000 over the next 10 years and create Europe’s strongest conventional army.

A 2024 study carried out for the French defence ministry by Sciences Po researcher Anne Muxel found 62 per cent of people aged 18 to 25 surveyed supported obligatory military service, while more than half were in favour of increasing resources for the military.

Speaking to French radio station RTL on Tuesday, Macron said France, the UK and other European countries were ready to send “reassurance troops” to Ukraine in the event of a peace agreement with Russia as a means of providing security guarantees to the country.

But he was quick to rule out the prospect of volunteers being sent to Ukraine. On Thursday, he said volunteers would serve only in mainland France or France’s overseas departments.

The sensitivity of reintroducing national service was brought home last week when General Fabien Mandon, armed forces chief, caused controversy by saying Paris needed to be ready to “accept losing its children” to protect itself from new threats.

“If our country falters because it is not ready to accept losing its children — because these things need to be said — and to suffer economically because priorities will go towards defence production, then we are at risk,” Mandon told a conference of mayors.

However, the prospect of national military service has been supported by opposition groups including the far-right Rassemblement National, whose president Jordan Bardella said the suspension of the service by Chirac was an “error”.

Beyond the introduction of voluntary military service, Macron hopes to increase the defence budget by €3.5bn in 2026 and €3bn in 2027, a total rise of 6 per cent, although this measure risks being delayed by the government’s struggles to pass a new Budget.