France is considering extending its nuclear umbrella to Europe. But can it?
With the U.S. increasingly sounding like its taking Russia ’s side, Europe scrambles for a new nuclear option
Sixty-four years ago, with the world gripped by the fear of a nuclear confrontation between superpowers, France's then-president Charles de Gaulle reportedly posed a question to John F. Kennedy on a visit to Paris: Was the U.S. president willing to sacrifice New York to save Paris?
Kennedy apparently never directly answered, responding that what mattered is that the Russians believe it.
Fast-forward to 2025, and that same question remains at the heart of collective nuclear defence. France's current president, Emmanuel Macron, has essentially invited other European countries — and everyone living in their capitals — to ask a similar question of him.
In a prime-time speech Wednesday night, Macron addressed the war in Ukraine, amid fears that Donald Trump may be abandoning its ally Ukraine but also possibly the 70-year-old NATO military alliance. Not only has Trump cut off Ukraine from the supply of armaments that has allowed it to hold out against Russia's invasion for three years, the U.S. president has also openly repeated Russian propaganda about NATO starting the war, and made no public demands of Russia to halt its attacks.
With a Vladimir Putin-led Russia posing an increasing threat to the continent's security, Macron said he would open talks with European allies about whether the umbrella of France's nuclear arsenal could be extended over them, as well.
Unreliable ally?
"I would like to believe that the United States will stay by our side, but we have to be ready if this isn't the case," Macron told his country.
Unlike Britain, whose nuclear warheads are delivered at the end of American missiles and whose command and control systems are linked, Macron reminded his countrymen that France's nuclear system is totally separate.
"It is completely sovereign and entirely French," Macron said. "However, in response to the historic call of the future German chancellor, I have decided to open the strategic debate on the protection of our European continental allies through our deterrence."
As of 2024, Russia has the largest number of nuclear weapons in the world, with more than 5,500, according to the Federation of American Scientists, followed by the U.S., with just over 5,000.
France is far back at 290, and Britain has even fewer, with 225, but they're the four and fifth largest such arsenals in the world.
But experts who've studied the politics of nuclear deterrence say it's not necessarily the number of warheads that count — it's whether your adversary believes you will use them if the climb up the escalation ladder reaches the top.
"Now the question would be, 'Would a French president or British prime minister actually risk Paris or London for Tallinn, [Estonia], for example? That's the real challenge," says David Blagden, professor in international security and strategy at the University of Exeter in England.
"In the Cold War, we came up with various ways of trying to increase that credibility. So things like putting what was often called 'trip wire' deployments of ground troops — for example, NATO troops or American, British, French troops in West Berlin.... And, so that the theory goes, that makes the extended deterrence more credible."
Sovereign arsenal
Between France and the U.K., Europe's two nuclear powers, Blagden says France is in a better position to provide the continent with what Macron called a "nuclear umbrella" as it has more ways of deploying such weapons, and thus more means to project deterrence.
For example, it can fit some of its fighter jets with nuclear missiles, which can then be stationed in other countries to send a pointed message and possibly deter any potential Russian action.
The U.K., on the other hand, has what is called a "sole nuclear platform," in that it can only launch its missiles from sea, via its fleet of Vanguard submarines.
Operating unseen under the water, military strategists say the subs are less useful for signalling or sending directed messages of deterrence to an adversary.
Currently, the U.S. has stationed nuclear weapons at six bases in five NATO countries: Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Italy and Turkey. In theory, Blagden says there's nothing stopping those same countries from swapping them out for French nukes.
"It can be done — but it really comes down to France's willingness to bear the potential escalatory risks and escalatory costs that would come with that."
Misguided idea?
Others who've studied the dynamic of nuclear deterrence are less convinced France is in a position to take over Europe's nuclear defence — or that even if it did, that it would dissuade aggression from leaders such as Putin.
"I think this is a deeply misguided idea," said Pavel Podvig, an independent analyst in Geneva who runs the website Russian Nuclear Forces, which tracks nuclear weapons-related issues.
Podvig says nuclear deterrence is a dubious concept precisely because he believes it's unlikely one country will sacrifice its own cities to try to save those in another country.
"Through all the years [of the Cold War], the Europeans have always had doubts about the strength of the [American] commitment," he told CBC News.
Podvig claims what kept the peace between the Soviets and Americans throughout many tense decades wasn't the threat of nuclear war — instead, it was "the system of norms, understandings and agreements between the states."
Historians are in agreement that it was de Gaulle's mistrust of the U.S. that led to France's development of a "sovereign" nuclear arsenal — and in the aftermath of Macron's speech Wednesday, French politicians from the across the political spectrum were quick to insist that whatever develops, it will still be France's president with his or her finger on the button.
Germany's likely incoming chancellor Friedrich Merz has said he supports the discussion, as have leaders in the Baltic states, Denmark, Poland and Sweden.
Threat to Russia
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, however, said Macron's nuclear rhetoric was a threat.
"Paris's ambitions to become the nuclear 'patron' of all of Europe have burst out into the open," said a statement from the country's Foreign Ministry. "This will not lead to strengthening the security of either France itself or its allies."
In a speech at London's Chatham House on Thursday, the Ukrainian general who led the successful defence of Kyiv in the early stages of Russia's full-scale invasion said he believes NATO's days are numbered, echoing the sense of urgency now felt across the continent.
"Washington's non-recognition of the aggression of [Russia] ... is also a new challenge, and not just for Ukraine, but for all of Europe," said Valerii Zaluzhnyi, now Ukraine's ambassador to the U.K.
"Not only Russia … is trying to destroy the world order, but the United States of America is actually destroying it completely."
If that turns out to be the case, Blagden, from the University of Exeter, says Europe will be thrust back into the kind of strategic situation it faced for much of the U.S.-Soviet rivalry of the Cold War.
In that dynamic, the Soviets held a sizable advantage in conventional forces and manpower while the West relied on its nuclear arsenal of so-called tactical weapons to even things up.
"NATO is only as good as the belief that the members, particularly the most powerful member, [the United States], will actually act to defend the other members."
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