France works with 10 European nations to increase strength as nuclear deterrent - report

The 'forward deterrence' plan involves the creation of new infrastructure, communications, early-warning and intelligence-sharing links with France's allies.

France is working with 10 other European nations to expand its capacity as a nuclear weapons power on the continent and a deterrent to Russian aggression as Europe's faith in the US's commitment to its security wanes, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday morning. 

The 'forward deterrence' plan involves the creation of new infrastructure, communications, early-warning and intelligence-sharing links with France's allies as well as deployments of French nuclear-enabled Rafale jet fighters across Europe. 

The UK, Germany, Poland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Finland, Norway, Sweden, and Denmark have all joined the project with varying degrees of involvement since French President Emmanuel Macron announced it in March. 

“We don’t have any plans to put nuclear weapons on Finnish soil in peacetime. But we do have plans for creating a strategic dilemma for Russia,” said Finnish President Alexander Stubb. 

“We felt it would be useful for our security to get information, to be involved in it. We don’t know where this is going to end, it’s probably a 10- to 15-years process.”

Instead of the countries all gathering together to work on the plan, France has been holding individual talks, leading European partner nations to constantly communicate with each other to compare what the French have told them, WSJ cited senior defense officials as saying. 

European countries doubt US reliability

The plan comes as faith in the US's willingness to defend Europe wanes. Doubts over if the US would risk nuclear war over the defense of a European ally have increased as US President Donald Trump strikes energy deals with Russian President Vladimir Putin and puts increasing pressure on Ukraine, WSJ wrote. 

France claims that the French program is more credible as the safety of European countries is of far more direct importance.

“There is one difference between France and the US–we share the same geography, we are part and parcel of the same continent, we have economic and sociological continuity with our neighbors writ large,” Chatel, Macron’s adviser, said at the Warsaw Security Conference.

In his speech announcing the initiative in March, Macron emphasized that France's vital interests were directly affected by its allies.

“Could we consider that the survival of our closest partners may be put at risk without it affecting our vital interests?” Macron said.

Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide said that the plan was not intended to "replace anything. It supplements the nuclear guarantees that were already there" from the US.

Program under French control

Macron also announced that France would resume making nuclear devices for the first time in decades and that the size of its stockpile would become confidential. Despite the involvement of other countries, the nuclear force will be entirely under French control, WSJ wrote. 

“The French will let us participate in their nuclear deterrence as much as the Americans,” one government minister of another European nation said.

According to the WSJ report, the decision was made to make the forward deterrence strategy acceptable across the political spectrum, including to the far-right party of Marine LePen who is polling ahead in the race for the presidency in next spring's elections.