The cutting of Mythos 5 and Fable 5 shook all of Europe. In France, the reaction of the entire political class was unanimous. An opportunity to be seized.
The cutting of Mythos and Fable 5 caused a real shock in Europe. In France, it had an effect rare enough to be underlined: a quasi-political consensus around the question of technological sovereignty.
The American artificial intelligence start-up Anthropic announced this Friday, June 12, that it would suspend access to its two most powerful models, Fable 5 and Mythos 5, to comply with a directive from the American government citing “national security”, just three days after their commercial launch.
And for once, the divisions have been erased. From the National Rally to La France insoumise, everyone issued their own warning. Everyone saw in this American decision the demonstration of a dependence that had become problematic.
For Jordan Bardella, artificial intelligence is already a major issue for national sovereignty. The president of the RN calls for strengthening support for Mistral AI and the entire French ecosystem.
Bruno Retailleau speaks of an “electroshock” and highlights France’s strengths: its nuclear energy, but also players like Mistral, OVHcloud or Scaleway.
Édouard Philippe believes that artificial intelligence is now a critical infrastructure and sees in this affair the demonstration of AI subject to the logic of American power.
Gabriel Attal, for his part, evokes a risk of “vassalization” in a technological war which has already begun.
Even on the left, Jean-Luc Mélenchon considers that this episode demonstrates the urgency of technological independence, while Olivier Faure calls for building a true European power. Behind these positions, we find the same reflex: that of economic patriotism.
The contradictions around capital
But this episode also highlights several contradictions. Because what Europe lacks today is not ambition.
For months, Brussels has been rolling out plans, strategies, roadmaps and declarations on artificial intelligence, semiconductors, the cloud, defense and digital sovereignty.
The problem is elsewhere. The problem is funding. You don’t build a technological power with press releases. We don’t make world champions emerge with indignant declarations on social networks. We finance sovereignty with capital. Lots of capital.
To allow companies like Mistral, OVHcloud or Scaleway to compete with the American giants, we need investors capable of committing billions over the long term and accepting the risk.
This is where the debate gets interesting. Because we cannot, at the same time, call for technological sovereignty and discourage the accumulation of capital which makes it possible to finance it.
We cannot demand more European champions while considering the investor as a problem rather than part of the solution.
This crisis also reminds us of the urgency of accelerating the Capital Markets Union, this European sea serpent which has been moving forward for ten years in small steps even though it conditions a large part of our economic autonomy.
Europe has now identified the danger. This is already progress. It remains to be seen whether she will agree to draw all the consequences. Because every crisis is an opportunity. However, we must avoid transforming it into a simple press release.
