On the night that the pro-Russian candidate lost the presidential elections in Romania, Moscow pressed the emergency button, adding the narrative on alleged “French interference” and the bogeyman Emmanuel Macron.
From Russia’s perspective, Romania’s sovereignty isn’t worth a dime and the will Romanians freely expressed by voting sn’t worth two rotten onions, while Romania’s stability, well-being and westernization represent a threat to Putin’s imperial project.
But what can you expect from this eternal autocracy that, historically is obsessed with changing borders through terrorism, lies, manipulation and war.
For this, however, Russia has always needed Trojan horses from the local populations it targets, because without them, the range of the remote control wielded by Moscow cannot reach far enough.
That is why it is especially interesting that George Simion reactivated himself after previously admitting his defeat late Sunday night and after he had admitted that the election had been a fair one.
For a few days, both George Simion and the Putin regime were agitating along the same lines and in in the same rhythm.
The topic: French interference in the elections, Macron’s involvement, Nicușor Dan’s subservience to Paris. As Russia’s agitation increases, so does Simion’s.
Rarely have we witnessed such an overlap between Russian puppeteers and the fans of their agenda in Romania!
George Simion, who has not convincingly debunked the old accusations brought by former Moldovan and Ukrainian officials regarding his interactions with the Russians, now has two new aspects to clarify: why did he change his mind from one day to the next regarding the presidential elections of May 18 and how come we see this impressive synchronization between him and Putin’s officials regarding both the core of the narrative and the rhythm in which he and they are agitated?
Until someone understands the “mystery”, perhaps it is worth rigorously focusing on the theme that both Simion and Russia are trying to impose in the public discourse in Romania: “interference” (in particular, “French interference”).
A first set of observations would be related to the manipulative nature of the use of this term by George Simion, the Russians and the related relays.
- It should be noted that Simion did not see any Russian interference in the elections in Romania, neither the 2024 presidential election or the May 2025 redo.
- Instead, Simion sees “French interference” and Macron’s involvement. But he only began to see this when Russia went on the offensive with this narrative.
- Russian interference in the electoral process in Romania has been proven both by the authorities in Bucharest and by the authorities of other states (plus: various independent internal and external analysts). Russian interference was exposed in all its splendor: with the names of the characters involved, the Russian intelligence services engaged in this endeavor, the cyber infrastructure used, methods, tactics and strategic objective.
- As far as France is concerned, Simion also commits a vile act of manipulation (of his own voters, first of all), putting a sign of equality between the Russian interference, carried out by the Russian secret services, and the public support expressed by France, through various officials or politicians in Paris, towards a pro-Western post-electoral path of Romania. For Romania to have such a path, it was normal for the French to want the victory of the pro-Western candidate, Nicușor Dan. But one is the involvement of the Russian secret services and their manipulation of the electorate by manipulating TikTok algorithms (which Russia has done) and quite another is active diplomacy and political stance (which France has done; moreover, what Romania’s other European allies have actually done). Things should therefore be very clear: France (and, I repeat, not only) had the natural interest of not seeing Romania overwhelmed by a new “Russian winter”, taking shape through a Simion presidency. As such, French diplomacy, in the broadest sense, was put at the service of this goal. Just as American diplomacy, commanded today by Donald Trump, was put at the service of the opposite of the French one, but similar to the Russian one.
- Moreover, if France did something extraordinary in these elections held in Romanians, openly expressing its support for a European Romania, therefore for a Nicușor Dan victory, it happened precisely because the Russians, previously, had done something extraordinary themselves: they manipulated the November 2024 vote and remobilized to manipulate the May 2025 vote, the objective being a Romania that would get closer to the Russian orbit again.
- Of all the European nations allied to Romania, France plays a special role in protecting Romania’s territory. Because France leads the NATO battle group in Romania. At the end of February, the French Minister of Defense, Sebastien Lecornu, clearly expressed, on French public radio, how things stand: “There is an irony of fate at the moment. We have a thousand French soldiers in Romania to reassure Romania. That is, to ensure that, globally, there is no Russian military aggression in Romania. At the same time, we see Russia manipulating the Romanian presidential elections. There is no longer even a need to penetrate Romania, it is possible that the Kremlin will elect the Romanian president.” (I wrote about this – HERE).
- In other words, France’s interference cannot be equated with Russia’s interference, and I explained this in the lines above. But France’s objectives related to Romania cannot be equated with Russia’s objectives related to Romania. First of all this is because the nature of the Romania-France relationship is fundamentally different from the nature of the Romania-Russia relationship. France is a strategic ally of Romania, within the EU, NATO and bilaterally. Russia is a declared enemy of NATO and the EU, implicitly a declared enemy of Romania as well. At the same time, Russia is a blackmailer in the bilateral relationship with Romania. Finally, while France has sent thousands of its soldiers to sacrifice itself for Romania’s security, Russia constantly threatens Romania’s security and has unleashed an all-out war on Romania’s borders, perfectly threatening by its very nature of war.
So, in the light of the above, isn’t the perfect Russian game played (once again) by the “patriot” George Simion as clear as possible?
But things are even more interesting if we now take George Simion’s violent attacks on France and its president and relate them to Russia’s attacks of unprecedented boldness and scale against France and its president.
To see in George Simion a poor free electron on such a front would be, I think, supreme naivety.
That second set of observations are as follows:
- Over the past two years, at a European level, France is the second most targeted European country by Russian disinformation after Ukraine. So, only Ukraine which is at war with Russia exceeds the interest shown by the Russian secret services in France. In such a context, it is self-evident that Paris’ vigilance towards Moscow’s intentions and actions should be at a much higher level compared to the vigilance of other European capitals. And this vigilance translates, implicitly, into counteracting and protective strategies and measures taken by Paris both upstream and downstream.
- The President of France and the First Lady are favorite targets for successful disinformation and image compromise operations. Undoubtedly, they are the most attacked presidential couple by Moscow at the moment and have been for years subject to personal attacks. It is important to remember that these operations began before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, only to be intensified later.
- For Russians, Macron has become a premium target since 2017, the year he became president.
- For the Russians, Macron is a huge problem for multiple reasons: he twice blocked the rise of the domestic far right to the presidency of the country, he blocked the rise of the far right at the governmental level, he proposed a Europe of defense complementary to NATO eight years ago (how visionary he was, given today’s misfortune, called Trump 2!), strongly supports the European effort to support Ukraine, and has now made the Europeans the offer to share the French nuclear umbrella, in case the Trump administration endangers the American nuclear umbrella for Europe.
- Moreover, Emmanuel Macron is the president of a secular state. This also makes the French leader a prime target in the cultural war centered on the so-called “traditional values”, unleashed by Putin domestically and internationally. Putin has no God, but he needs the exploitation of divinity and ancestral traditions to ensure and legitimize the perpetuation of absolute power in the country and to make allies abroad.
The demonization of Emmanuel Macron and France are two essential tools in Putin’s offensive on the Ukrainian, domestic and European fronts.
Curiously, however, this is not necessarily the case. Curiously, the demonization of Macron and France have in the meantime become essential elements for George Simion as well.
It is simplistic to see in Simion’s anti-French offensive only petty political and electoral interests, arising from the frustrations of the AUR leader after his electoral defeat.
In fact, it is even dangerous to limit your interpretation to just that, because you risk seeing in George Simion less than he represents.
The political and geopolitical context gives it away easily. The modus operandi strips it down to the skin. The style is, clearly, an imported one. The objectives it pursues are far too closely aligned with those defined in the East.
Just think that just a week ago, this Trojan horse had a good chance of becoming the next president of Romania.
Imagine for a moment what this could have meant for Romania, for those who voted for him, and those who rejected him.
