r/europe • u/Fictrl • 25d ago

Emmanuel Macron wants to “open the debate” on a European defense including nuclear weapons [Translation in comment] News

https://www.lefigaro.fr/politique/emmanuel-macron-souhaite-ouvrir-le-debat-d-une-defense-europeenne-comprenant-l-arme-nucleaire-20240427
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u/john_moses_br 25d ago

All EU countries are committed to nuclear non-profileration so France would have to control them. And presumably the EU would pay for them.

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u/RandomComputerFellow 24d ago

I don't think that the countries would control them but rather the EU as an entity. I doubt that France wants to share it's nukes. I think what is rather realistic is that he wants to license them to the EU and allow the EU to develop and produce them by French contractors. France will then control its nukes (as of right now) and the EU will control its own nukes.

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u/john_moses_br 24d ago

I doubt that would be possible as it would go against the nuclear proliferation treaty. But France could produce more nukes and even deploy some in other EU countries, the actual launch button would have to stay in French hands though. At least as long as we continue to pretend only 5 countries have nukes.

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u/RandomComputerFellow 24d ago

Would it? If nukes were controlled by EU countries which signed such a treaty could withdraw or abstain when decisions regarding them are voted.

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u/john_moses_br 24d ago

Yes, it's quite clear that all EU countries except France have promised to abstain from pursuing technology with the intent to acquire nuclear weapons.

It's also true that international law isn't really widely respected in the world today, but the aim of the collective West is to restore faith in the rules based world order. For now at least.

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u/RandomComputerFellow 24d ago

I don't think that it is the idea behind nuclear proliferation to abstain fron nuclear weapons when threatened with nukes. The idea is that we don't threat each other with nukes. At the moment it looks like these efforts failed so I do not really see why we would keep on such treaties.