Nuclear arsenal of France to be increased
France has announced its intention to increase its nuclear arsenal and extend its deterrent to protect other European countries, the BBC reports, in what the broadcaster called a “a major development of its nuclear defence policy.”
“The next 50 years will be an era of nuclear weapons,” President Emmanuel Macron said at a speech in Brittany, explaining that the changes are in response to an increasingly unstable environment.
Speaking to naval officers in front of a nuclear submarine at the Ile Longue base near Brest, he announced that France will increase its number of nuclear warheads from the current level of approximately 300. He also revealed that in 2036, the country will expand its nuclear arsenal with a new nuclear-armed submarine named The Invincible.
Eight other European countries, the UK, Germany, Poland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Greece, Sweden, and Denmark have agreed to take part in a new “advanced deterrence” strategy, he said.
“We are arming up together with our friends so that our enemies will never dare to attack us,” Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk wrote on X.
The eight countries could also take part in exercises of the French air-launched nuclear capacity, force de frappe, and host air bases which could station nuclear bombers, Macron said.
This would enable the French Strategic Air Forces (FAS) to “spread out across the depth of the European continent… and thus complicate the calculations of our adversaries,” he said. The country’s partners would also share in the development of “auxiliary” capacities under a new nuclear doctrine, including space-based alarm systems, air defence to shoot incoming drones and missiles, and long-range missiles.
Image: © European Union, 1998 – 2026
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