Jean-Marie Le Pen is the father of Marine Le Pen, and the founder of the National Front, the French party that pretends to resist the enforcement of globalization and its authoritarian agenda. He is well-known worldwide for his controversial stands against immigration, neo-liberalism and European construction. He was in 2002 present to second round of French presidential elections. A fierce anticommunist in the past, he is now favourable to a rapprochement with Russia, as he explains to Nicolas Bonnal. This interview for Pravda.Ru has been prepared too with the help of French historian and scholar Jean Centini.
First point, the questions on the FN and you:
"Mr. Le Pen, what were your youthful ideals?"
"My youthful ideals were impregnated with patriotism. During the war, I was a teenager, and my father died in France, when his boat sank after the explosion of a German mine. I then became a ward of the nation. The formula by which the nation was conducting my adoption greatly influenced me then and since my youth, I have been constantly used to serve my "adoptive parent" by my involvement in army, first in Indochina and especially in Algeria. Once the colonial wars ended, I have constantly used politics to defend France, denouncing the blows which stroke her and providing lifesaving measures, against all odds."
"What were your reasons for hostility to communism?"
"I have always been hostile to communism. I was raised in the Catholic Christian culture, and it was its antithesis: denial of freedom and of spirituality. It represents the path to alienation. Beyond its utopian character, it was manipulating the deep desire for change of the workers and hindering the whole society in open prisons. In addition, the French Communist Party was echoing more the interests of the USSR, then "home of international socialism," than those of the French workers and France in general."
"What threats have replaced for you the Communism?"
"Today, the communist threat, collapsed for 20 years, has been replaced by another deadly utopia: Globalism, new internationalist ideology and materialism that has the sole aim to maximize the profits of big capitalists at the expense of the Nations and their peoples.
"There is too Islamism and its martyrs. All these ideologies have in common to undermine the foundations of the Hellenic-Christian civilization and to substitute another, which is not ours."
"After the re-election of Obama, what do you think of American civilization and how do you see the future of the West?"
"Obama's re-election adds and retracts nothing to American "civilization". The United States is a declining power economically (despite the exploitation of shale gas) and strategically. It is just the centre of an Empire, and Proponents of this "Empire" strive in vain to delay the collapse. Economically, it continues to borrow and the U.S. Federal Reserve is also currently the only to buy U.S. Treasury bonds by creating more dollars, which will inevitably lead to the collapse of the dollar. Militarily it continues to seek to undermine the position of the other regional powers such as Russia. We can see today in Syrian clash that Russia and China defend conceptions of respect for authority while American and Westerners support extremist and dangerous insurgencies. These uprisings brought Islamism to power in Tunisia, Egypt, and Iraq, resulting in anarchy and ethnic bursting. If the West continues to accept in its midst millions of Muslim immigrants and to support Islamists in the Arab-Muslim countries, the future of the entire block looks bleak. Its very survival is at stake."
Second point, the situation of the FN in France:
"Can you explain the isolation of FN? What explains that the French electorate does not support more your movement?"
"The isolation of the Front National is essentially the result of the propaganda created against him by the great majority of the French press owned by financial groups, politicians and the system.
"Against all media-political-financial ensembles, the National Front is found to fight alone, and yet, its president, Marine Le Pen won nearly 18% of the votes in the last presidential elections. The courageous description of the situation in the country, and the lifesaving measures proposed by the National Front, will quickly bring a large number of French to join us."
"Why did not you support president Sarkozy in the second round?"
"Nicolas Sarkozy held various speeches close to those of the National Front, with some success in 2007. But the policy he actually carried out during the five years of his presidency was radically different. He showed a desire to limit immigration: yet it has never been as important as during his presidency; he said he wanted to break the crime wave but crime has been increasing. In all areas he has pursued a policy contrary to the interests of the French, creating higher taxes, increasing European integration ... In these circumstances, why would we have supported Nicolas Sarkozy?"
"What is your opinion on repeated repentances of Mr. Holland? Where do they lead?"
"The repentance of Mr. Hollande, for example with regard to the war in Algeria, is only to thank those who have elected him: 90% of Muslims with French nationality preferred him to Sarkozy who served them in practice but had a conservative image. These repentances are criminal. On the one hand, they are not based on historical evidence; on the other hand, they only lead immigrant people to hate France. These acts of repentance undermine consciousness and national pride."
Third, Russia and Europe:
"How do you explain the aggressiveness of Europe vis-à-vis Russia? Is Russia a democracy for you?"
"European nations continue to decline in all areas. They do not see a with a good eye Russia's strategic dynamism; all the experts thought Russia was dead 15 years ago. The European Union is a true oligarchy where most of the actual decision-makers have no democratic legitimacy. For this institutional monster, it is thus easier to give lessons of democracy to the whole world than to apply them. Please note that in France the National Front has only two members (out of 577 deputies!) in the parliament, while Marine Le Pen had gathered nearly one voter in five. If Russia is not a perfect democracy (is there one anyway?), Europe certainly has no lessons to give her in this area!"
"Mr. Le Pen, what common future do you see between Russia and Europe?"
"I am campaigning for the creation of a harmonious ensemble, animated by the vision of a common destiny of the entire northern area, from Brest to Vladivostok. Russia and the Central and Western Europe have many commonalities and many converging interests. Faced with a world increasingly unstable, and our demographical winter, almost suicidal, it is certain that our European civilization would find a tool of salvation with this union. But it is not the interest of what remains the leading world power, the United States, and of the international firms, and it is clear that the castes will oppose to it with all their might..."
"How to deal with Atlanticism?"
"I have long been favourable to NATO at a time when Soviet tanks were stationed at 500 km of our border and represented a criminal system using communist parties like Trojan horses.
"But today, this threat has collapsed.
"Atlanticism therefore has no reason to be and just constitutes today an organization dedicated to organize the military power of the U.S. forces and their auxiliaries in Europe. Since twenty years, NATO has also intervened only against the stability of the world: in Yugoslavia, where the mafia and Islamism rule, see Bosnia and now Kosovo, in Iraq or Libya where Gaddafi (although an assured dictator like Saddam Hussein) assured at least the stability of his country. Therefore, away with Atlanticism, for this has become the sweet name of American imperialism!
"You asked me earlier why the National Front had not supported Sarkozy in the second round of the presidential elections; I would add that it is also because he decided the full reintegration of France into NATO while General de Gaulle, in the late 60s had withdrawn our nation from the integrated command."
Fourth and final point: Islam and multiculturalism
"There are two million Muslims in Moscow ... Does the Russian state need to finance the construction of mosques? What to do in this regard in France or Russia?"
"It is not for me to advocate what the Russian state have to do with Muslim places of worship, for I am too respectful of any national sovereignty ... In contrast, I am viscerally opposed to that funding in France. Islam is not a religion; it is also a civilization, a legal system often contrary to our ancestral customs and our secular laws. Promote the development of Islam in our Christian nations is a danger, because as thought the French historian Ernest Renan in the 19th century, "Islam was liberal when he was weak and violent when he was strong. » And if today Muslims can live in peace with Christians or unbelievers in our country, what will happen when, given the demographic factor that plays in their favour, they are the majority, at least strong enough to impose us to meet their uses? Nowhere in the history of Islam, when his followers were dominant, minorities were respected or regarded as having equal rights. It is the Koran itself which not only permits but even requires that behaviour."
"Is the Islamization you are reporting inevitable?"
"Islamization is simply the consequence of mass immigration facing our countries, from Central Asia to Russia, from the Maghreb and Muslim Africa to Western Europe. Islamization is not inevitable if we stop to let enter in our country millions of Muslim immigrants every year and more, and if we compel those present to comply with our customs. And if that does not suit them, they are free to practice their way of life elsewhere..."
"Are not western people already used and resigned?"
"In France, people are beginning to fear Islam because it is more rapid, visible and massive, affecting their daily lives: veiled women in the streets, lack of respect for freedom of women, prohibition of pork in school canteens, construction of mosques with minarets ... with its procession of extremists like the one in Toulouse last spring, who has murdered in the name of Islam 7 people including 3 children."
"What do you think of the last Western policy in Libya, especially now in Syria? And how do you consider the Russian attitude?"
"Western attitude, as I said earlier, is criminal because it intends to replace or substitute regimes that are dictatorships (but certainly bring stability to their country and respect for religious minorities, including Christians) by the chaotic rise of Islamist dictatorship that leave those who are not of the same faith choice between the suitcase or the coffin ... as one of the slogans of Syrian rebels shows: "Christians in Lebanon and the Alawites in the cemetery." But subversive Western backers prefer then to stuff their ears...
"Russian policy in this area is more sensible: it respects the sovereignty and territorial integrity of States; it is always realistic and prefers stability to chaos."
Interview prepared by Nicolas Bonnal