French President Emmanuel Macron said on Monday France will increase the number of its nuclear warheads, warning that the world is “hardening” and Europe must take greater responsibility for its own security.
Speaking at the Ile Longue naval base on France’s Atlantic coast, home to the country’s ballistic missile submarines, Mr Macron said he had decided to expand France’s arsenal for the first time since at least 1992. France currently maintains fewer than 300 nuclear warheads.
“I have decided to increase the numbers of warheads of our arsenal,” Mr Macron said. “My responsibility is to ensure that our deterrence maintains – and will maintain in the future – its assured destructive power.”
The president described the new posture as “forward deterrence” and said it would allow for “the temporary deployment of elements of our strategic air forces to allied countries” across Europe.
He stressed, however, that there would be no sharing of decision-making authority over the use of France’s nuclear weapons.
“To be free, one needs to be feared,” Mr Macron said.
France is the only nuclear power in the European Union since Britain left the bloc in 2020. The move comes as European leaders express growing concern over Russia’s war in Ukraine and doubts about long-term United States security commitments under the so-called nuclear umbrella.
Mr Macron said recent shifts in US defence priorities and the emergence of new threats had encouraged Europe to take its destiny “more firmly into its own hands”.
Talks on deterrence cooperation have begun with Britain, Germany, Poland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Greece, Sweden and Denmark, Mr Macron said. Under the plan, some partners will be able to host French strategic air forces, while allies’ conventional forces may participate in French nuclear exercises.
In a joint statement, Mr Macron and German chancellor Friedrich Merz said the two countries would deepen integration in deterrence starting this year, “including German conventional participation in French nuclear exercises and joint visits to strategic sites.”
The Netherlands said it was in strategic talks with France on nuclear deterrence as “a supplement to, and not a replacement for, NATO’s collective defence and nuclear deterrence capabilities.”
Polish prime minister Donald Tusk wrote on X that “we are arming up together with our friends so that our enemies will never dare to attack us.”
Mr Macron also ruled out any arrangement under which German aircraft would carry French nuclear bombs, insisting that any decision to use France’s nuclear weapons would remain solely in the hands of the French president.
“If we had to use our arsenal, no state, however powerful, could shield itself from it, and no state, however vast, would recover from it,” Mr Macron said.
He said adversaries were becoming “bolder”, alliances more uncertain and nuclear risks higher than in the past. Russia’s war in Ukraine, China’s rapid military build-up and the expansion of arsenals by other regional powers were all contributing to what he called a more dangerous global environment.
The announcement drew criticism from disarmament campaigners.
The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons said the move risked escalating tensions and undermining global non-proliferation efforts.
“These are indiscriminate weapons that are banned under the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons,” said the group’s executive director, Melissa Parke. “This is not progress, it’s a nuclear arms race that no one can afford.”
France and Britain remain the only Western European countries with nuclear arsenals. The US and Russia possess far larger stockpiles, with thousands of warheads each.
Mr Macron said the expansion was not about entering into an arms race but ensuring that “no adversary” could contemplate a strike against France or its interests without facing unacceptable consequences.
