Why Macron wants a ‘Euronuke’

President Emmanuel Macron has raised the nuclear card. He has offered to provide nuclear cover for Europe as fears intensify that President Trump is moving further away from NATO and from America’s historic obligations towards European allies.

The idea of France, the fourth largest nuclear weapons power in the world, extending its nuclear deterrence is not new. Macron is just one of many French presidents who have contemplated providing a European dimension to France’s force de frappe.

However, today the context is dramatically different. For the first time in NATO’s history, the US sided with Russia and not its European allies when the Trump administration refused to condemn Moscow for the invasion of Ukraine at the UN.

Trump wants to focus America’s war-planning efforts on China and, as a consequence, the rest of NATO is fearful that the US will leave the defense of Europe to the Europeans — and that could mean a less reliable American nuclear umbrella.

Trump appears to believe that his rapprochement with Vladimir Putin will be sufficient to deter, or at least put off, the Russian president from considering any further aggression in Europe.

Europe neither trusts that view nor feels reassured that in the event of a future Russian military attack on a NATO member, the US will rush to the alliance’s aid, as required under Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty.

To meet this unprecedented moment in the alliance’s seventy-sixth year, Macron has envisaged a situation in which Trump becomes unwilling to use America’s nuclear deterrence to stop the Russian hordes in their tracks.

Macron is reported to have raised the notion of a French nuclear umbrella for Europe in his seemingly fraught meeting with Trump in the White House on Monday.

Specifically, according to the Telegraph, such an umbrella would consist of Rafale bombers armed with nuclear-tipped cruise missiles being stationed in Germany.

Questions have been asked about a possible new role for the United Kingdom. Could Britain’s nuclear deterrent also be offered in a joint Anglo-French force to protect Europe in the event of what would be a dangerously risky decision by the Trump administration to withdraw all of its 100 air-launched nuclear bombs currently located in five European countries: Germany, Belgium, Turkey, the Netherlands, and Italy.

Friedrich Merz, the leader of the election-winning Christian Democratic Union who is about to become Germany’s new chancellor, appears keen on the idea. He would like the UK to be involved, too.

In many ways it’s a false premise. The UK no longer possesses air-launched nuclear bombs. The inventory of WE-177 free-fall bombs was withdrawn and dismantled in 1998. The UK is the only nuclear power to rely solely on one deterrent system, the submarine-launched Trident II D5 strategic missile.

The UK’s four Vanguard-class ballistic-missile submarines — due to be replaced by Dreadnought-class boats costing $32 billion from the 2030s — are formally assigned to the defense of NATO. The UK deterrent has been intrinsically part of NATO’s nuclear strategy since 1962. The French deterrent is independent of NATO.

The UK, unlike France, has been a prominent member of NATO’s Nuclear Planning Group since it was set up in 1966. However, the UK deterrent remains an operationally independent system and only the prime minister has the authority to press the button.

France, on the other hand, has two arms to its nuclear deterrent capability: four Triomphant-class submarines armed with M51 missiles, and the Rafale nuclear bombers. The total number of warheads is around 290, compared with Britain’s estimated 225.

If Europe were to lose the US nuclear umbrella, might Putin take a gamble?

Historically, France has always tried to impress on its European allies the need for an alternative Europe-led military capability to complement, or supplant if necessary, the US in order to safeguard the continent from an American president determined to pull up the drawbridge and focus on Fortress America.

However, even France is not as independent a nuclear power as it likes to portray. In the 1970s, when Richard Nixon was president and Georges Pompidou was the French leader, top secret discussions were held to arrange for American nuclear specialists to give guidance to their French counterparts to assist France with their ballistic missile program and nuclear safety procedures.

There was no exchange of nuclear technology, but the Nixon deal brought the US and France closer together in forging an effective French nuclear deterrent.

Britain, of course, is in the unique position of enjoying a close nuclear weapons partnership with the US, following the 1958 Mutual Defense Agreement which allowed for the sharing of nuclear technology information and materials; and the Polaris Sales Agreement, signed on April 6, 1963 by President John F. Kennedy and Prime Minister Harold Macmillan in which the UK bought Polaris missiles for the Royal Navy’s Resolution-class submarines.

The sales deal was amended in 1980 to enable the UK to purchase Trident missiles to replace Polaris. In each case, the UK’s Atomic Weapons Establishment designed the warheads for the missiles.

As a result of this “very special” relationship, Britain is inextricably tied to the US on nuclear weapons strategy, technology and submarine reactor development. The prime minster may have sole authority to launch a missile, but a large proportion of the submarine-launched deterrent is US-made. (But there is no US in-built piece of technology that would enable an American president to prevent the prime minister from going solo).

The idea of a “Euronuke” or an Anglo-French joint deterrent force, in the absence of the US umbrella, might seem a concept too far, although the British and French do cooperate on nuclear weapons matters, such as safety, and are involved in a joint research program.

However, the key to everything is deterrence credibility. Would Putin hesitate to order troops into Europe if he knew the European nuclear cover consisted of only a few hundred French and British warheads without the might of American firepower behind them?

The accepted theology of nuclear deterrence is that if only a small proportion of nukes can get through missile defenses, it would still pose a grave and, therefore, unacceptable risk. And yet, if Europe were to lose the US nuclear umbrella, might Putin take the gamble?