At the invitation of President Macron, Prime Minister Modi of India is guest of honor at today’s Bastille Day parade at Paris. Mr. Macron, who has been keeping a low profile since his country erupted just weeks ago in the most intense riots in nearly two decades, appears to have decided that pageantry and fireworks — many of which have otherwise been called off across France — are a fitting occasion for a public appearance.

On first consideration, the Modi-Macron Bastille Day pairing appears odd. That Mr. Macron has chosen to celebrate liberté, égalité, and fraternité with a leader criticized for upending all three in India has also raised eyebrows. Yet Mr. Macron’s ability to sustain these values is similarly suspect. Binding the two men, too, is a shared desire to go it alone on the world stage. The visit of Mr. Modi, which centers heavily on defense cooperation, might also inform Mr. Macron on sound border defense. 

During his visit, Mr. Modi has finalized an order for some two dozen Rafale-Marine fighter jets, which are tailored for use on aircraft carriers, of which India has two in service. Under another contract with France’s Naval Group, India will purchase three Scorpène attack submarines in addition to the six it has already acquired. French defense contractor and engine maker, Safran, has also been clamoring to secure an agreement to jointly develop fighter jet engines.

For India, a deal with Safran would enable it to bypass the United States’ International Traffic in Arms Regulation, which controls and restricts the export of American defense technologies and which makes uncertain any major gains to be had from India’s recently agreed to co-production of F414 engines with General Electric. According to India’s Times Now, Safran’s offer includes “no restrictions on … any access to sensitive issues.”

No doubt, for a country whose defense policy is rooted in the idea of Atmanirbhar Bharat — self-reliance — such an offer is appealing. New Delhi, long averse to any mutual defense initiatives, seeks to acquire military technologies to boost its own capabilities so that it can emerge as a great power capable of balancing Communist China on its own. 

Despite American and other diplomatic calls for it to reduce its military reliance on Russia, India does not presume that any defense deals impose on it any further obligations — and it has as little interest in preserving the American-led rules-based international order as it does in seeing it usurped. 

For Mr. Macron, this is fireworks-worthy stuff. “We are making problems for ourselves for tomorrow,” Mr. Macron recently said of European purchases of American military equipment. The French president has previously cautioned against Europe becoming an American “vassal,” and has continued to tout his concept of “strategic autonomy” — though, six years into his presidency, what this means remains something of an enigma.

Still, for the French president, arms deals with India would boost the strength of his country’s defense sector and advance his visions of an untethered France and Europe. Yet before Mr. Macron’s rêves get the best of him, he has some housekeeping to do. For while Mr. Modi’s efforts are largely geared toward securing the Indian border, particularly along the Line of Actual Control with China, Mr. Macron has left France’s borders open, and his nation largely exposed.

The fruits of that approach have been on full display across much of the country earlier this month. Granted, among the rioters were many youths who delight in the spectacle of destruction, as well as those with a history of rendezvous with the police, and far-left extremists in search of their revolution. On their own, their rampage suggests a broken social bond, a frayed fraternité.

Yet the unfortunate reality is that among the many who took to the streets were those driven not by the death of a 17-year-old Algerian boy, but by a contempt for France’s traditionally Western, Christian, and Jewish culture. Christian churches were destroyed, and Holocaust memorials desecrated. Found written on the wall of an Evangelical church at Marseille was the message: “The last prophet is Mohamed.”

Last year, France issued more than 320,000 residence permits, a record, and an increase of more than 17 percent compared to 2021. Some 3.8 million foreigners are now French residents. The majority are from Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia. These figures do not account for the largely unchecked illegal migrant flows into to the country – some 250,000 each year. No doubt, a great deal of those who arrive do so in the search of a better life and with a readiness to assimilate into French society. 

Others, however, do not. So, as messieurs Macron and Modi gather to honor France’s national day, many French are left to feel that their national identity has been confiscated by fanciful government policies and the continued threat of mob violence. Mr. Macron’s vision of a France untethered has resulted in a France untethered from itself, as its citizens look on in disbelief.

India is a “giant of world history which will have a decisive role for our future,” Mr. Macron said yesterday in conversation with military leaders from both nations. If he turns out to be right, it will be because of Mr. Modi’s efforts to fortify India’s borders, shore up its military, and protect — however imperfectly — its values. The gravity of Atmanirbhar Bharat is a far cry from the naiveté of Mr. Macron’s “strategic autonomy.”