DISINFO: Charles De Gaulle defended the project of Europe from the Atlantic to the Pacific oceans
SUMMARY
Former French president Charles de Gaulle was in favour of a Europe from Brest to Vladivostok.
RESPONSE
Historical manipulation to make the Eurasian political vision of the Kremlin acceptable by Europeans. The quote is not from Charles de Gaulle but Vladimir Putin.
Charles de Gaulle referred several times in his speeches to Europe from the Atlantic to the Ural, a geographical reference rather than a political one at a time when the iron curtain separated Europe from two opposite sides.
Historian Gaël-Georges Moullec studied the French-Soviet relations in his book: For a Europe from the Atlantic to the Urals - Franco-Soviet relations (1956-1974). If De Gaulle wanted special relations there was no fascination with the regime of the Kremlin, on the opposite, he hoped that it would eventually end.
Vladimir Putin by contrast referred often to a Eurasian project that would be from Atlantic to Pacific, from Lisbon to Vladivostok. In 2021 the Russian president even attributed this expression to Charles de Gaulle, but Russian publications insisted that this is incorrect as the French president had different words and referred to a very different dream.
Read also other cases about historical revisionism.