President Emmanuel Macron has been contemplating extending the strategic arsenal to cowl different EU members
France will improve one in all its important air bases alongside the border with Germany to host the Rafale fighter planes armed with nuclear cruise missiles, President Emmanuel Macron mentioned on Tuesday.
The Luxeuil-Saint-Sauveur base in japanese France hosted nuclear weapons till 2011, when the planes have been relocated to a special website.
“The Luxeuil air base is about to be upgraded in an unprecedented manner and regain its full function in France’s nuclear deterrent,” Macron mentioned.
“By 2035, Luxeuil would be the first base to host the subsequent model of the Rafale and its hypersonic nuclear missiles,” the president introduced. He added that the garrison will double in dimension to almost 2,000 army and civilian personnel to accommodate two Rafale squadrons.
The federal government will spend €1.5 billion ($1.64 billion) to modernize the bottom and velocity up Rafale orders.
With out mentioning Russia by title, Macron mentioned that France has discovered itself in “an more and more harmful and unsure world” since open hostilities broke out between Moscow and Kiev in 2022.
The announcement comes after Germany’s chancellor-designate, Friedrich Merz, recommended that France might prolong its nuclear arsenal to guard Germany and different EU members. Macron responded by saying that he would launch a dialogue on the matter.
Russia has condemned the EU’s “militarization” applications as reckless and escalatory. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov informed reporters earlier this month that “confrontational rhetoric and confrontational plans that we at the moment are seeing in Brussels and in European capitals might hamper discovering a peaceable decision of the Ukraine battle.
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