French nuclear-armed aircraft may soon be based on British soil following President Emmanuel Macron’s unveiling of a sweeping expansion to France’s deterrence strategy.Speaking from Île Longue, the secretive Atlantic submarine base in Brittany, the French leader announced what he termed “advanced deterrence”.The policy would theoretically permit the temporary stationing of France’s strategic air forces across participating European nations.President Macron said: “We must strengthen our nuclear deterrent in the face of multiple threats and we must consider our deterrence strategy deep within the European continent, with full respect for our sovereignty.”
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The initiative would see nuclear-capable jets dispersed across the continent in what the president described as “an archipelago of force” intended to “complicate our adversaries’ calculations”.The other European nations who have signed up to the scheme alongside Britain are Germany, Poland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Greece, Sweden and Denmark.The policy represents a direct evolution of the Northwood cooperation agreement struck between Paris and London in July 2025, which established that while the two countries’ nuclear arsenals remain independent, they “can be coordinated”.During his state visit to Britain last July, Mr Macron and Sir Keir Starmer committed to working “more closely than ever before” on nuclear deterrence matters.Senior British defence officials participated in a French strategic air force exercise this winter, the first occasion they had done so, marking a tangible step towards deeper integration between Europe’s only two nuclear-armed states.President Macron also revealed that France would expand its nuclear warhead stockpile, the first such increase since the early 1990s. The arsenal currently stands at an estimated 290 warheads, making France the world’s fourth-largest nuclear power behind Russia, the United States and China.Standing before one of France’s four nuclear submarines, the president emphasised the devastating power at his disposal, noting that a single missile from such a vessel carried more destructive force than “all of the [conventional] bombs dropped in the Second World War”.LATEST DEVELOPMENTSFrance fails to stop two-thirds of small boat crossings as Keir Starmer told to stop paying Emmanuel MacronKeir Starmer meets with Emmanuel Macron in Egypt ahead of historic peace deal despite US ambassador slamming ‘delusional’ LabourInside France’s ‘Orwellian free speech crackdown’ – as Labour warned not to launch similar media attackPresident Macron said: “An upgrade of our arsenal is essential. That’s why I have decided to increase the number of warheads”, declining to specify the scale of the expansion.He stressed that ultimate authority over France’s nuclear weapons would remain exclusively with him, adding: “There will be no sharing of the ultimate decision, its planning, or its implementation.”Beyond nuclear coordination, President Macron unveiled substantial conventional military cooperation. Germany, Britain and France will jointly develop very long-range missile systems under the European long-range strike approach, known as Elsa.This trilateral effort responds to Russia’s expanding missile capabilities and the unravelling of international arms control frameworks.The French President said: “The field of rules is a field of ruins”, pointing to the collapse of the intermediate-range nuclear forces treaty and the expiration of the new nuclear-arms reduction treaty between Washington and Moscow.He identified China’s rapid nuclear expansion and heightened proliferation concerns surrounding Iran and North Korea as contributing to what he characterised as a period “fraught with risk”.The initiative was developed “in full transparency with the United States” and in close coordination with Britain, Mr Macron added.A British government spokesman welcomed the proposals outlined by President Macron, confirming that concrete measures to strengthen nuclear cooperation had been agreed through the Northwood Declaration and at last year’s UK-France summit.The Government spokesman said: “The UK and France are both resolved to deter threats against Europe and will not be intimidated by Russian nuclear rhetoric.”They added that mutual collaboration with France reinforces existing commitments to allies “in an uncertain and dangerous world”.The announcement comes as France also pledged to dispatch anti-missile and anti-drone systems to Cyprus following drone attacks on RAF Akrotiri, the British sovereign base targeted by Iranian-made Shahed drones on Monday.
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