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A project to introduce unmanned sites is part of a broader adoption of digital technologies.

Quelques jours après une séquence devenue virale sur les réseaux sociaux, le ministre de l’Agriculture, Yacine Oualid, est revenu sur l’incident de Blida. À travers […]

L’article Exit le « Weli Ghedwa » : après la scène de Blida, Yacine Oualid lance une guerre contre la bureaucratie est apparu en premier sur .

Dès ce jeudi matin à 7h, un nouveau service de transport s’ajoute aux déplacements quotidiens entre Tipaza et Alger. La société publique ETUSA a inauguré […]

L’article ETUSA : une nouvelle ligne de bus directe relie Alger à cette ville est apparu en premier sur .

Ethiopia unveils its first unmanned, 'smart' police station where citizens can report crimes on automated touch screens.

Eleni Ekmetsioglou, Non-Resident Fellow, ELIAMEP

The French President gave a much-awaited speech at the French strategic submarine force (FOST: Force Océanique Stratégique) base of Ile Longue in Brittany, last Monday (02.03.2026). It was a historical moment for France and an even more critical event for the future of the European continent. Even though the European dimension of France’s vital interests has been highlighted many times in the past by all Presidents since François Mitterrand, Emmanuel Macron is the first president that acted upon this claim and created the basis for a European cooperation scheme on nuclear deterrence. The scheme comprises of bilateral agreements with seven states – Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, Greece, Poland, Denmark and Sweden- at the heart of which lies the coordination on conventional support of nuclear operations, what the French call ‘épaulement’.

As a reminder, France is estimated to have about 290 nuclear warheads. The French nuclear arsenal encompasses four nuclear submarines (SSBNs) that can carry up to 64 nuclear warheads each in its MIRV’ed Submarine Lunched Ballistic Missiles (SLBMs). In addition, the French nuclear arsenal includes two squadrons (40 aircraft in total) of nuclear capable Rafale aircraft (Force Aérienne Stratégique) where the nuclear warhead is delivered by a mid-range cruise missile, the ASMPA (air-sol moyenne portée-amélioré).

Continuities and discontinuities in Macron’s speech

The French, to their credit, worked hard to adapt and adjust their very unique nuclear posture in a way that is fitted for the challenging geopolitical environment Europe is faced with these days. Within this context, some components of the French nuclear posture were left to the past while others were repeated and further highlighted. What was not negotiable for the French side was their absolute control over the planification, implementation and ultimate use of the nuclear weapon in the event of crisis. While President Macron for the first time introduced the term ‘forward deterrence’ (dissuasion avancée) to extend French protection over its partners, he did highlight that France would not be dragged into others’ wars and that the definition of France’s vital interests will lie within the President’s responsibilities only and with no exception.  Another important continuity was France’s explicit rejection of battlefield nuclear weapons reiterating its commitment to regard the nuclear bomb as a strategic weapon that is militarily unusable and only politically useful within the context of deterrence.

Continuities aside, some important modifications to France’s nuclear posture were mentioned in the speech. President Macron announced that France will further consolidate its tritium production and that it will seek to increase its number of nuclear warheads escaping from France’s cherished principle of ‘strict efficiency’ (stricte suffisance). It was stressed that the exact numbers will not be disclosed, and that France will no longer be transparent about the size and the composition of its nuclear arsenal. Another principle that was left to the past was the term ‘dommages inacceptables’ (unacceptable damage). In previous articulations of its nuclear posture, France claimed to cause unacceptable damage to the adversary that would threaten its vital interests with the possibility of firing a warning shot when the President fell that the nature of the conflict was about to cross the nuclear threshold in order to reinstate deterrence. On March 2nd, however, the French President did not talk about causing unacceptable damage to the adversary anymore but instead he highlighted that France’s posture will be centered around a nuclear strike the adversary would not be able to recover from. This raises a number of questions about France’s targeting policy. Based on France’s nuclear history, one could hypothesize that the new posture is a more expansive version of its traditional countervalue strategy. However, the way Macron phrased it leaves room for one to wonder if France’s targeting policy has been modified towards the inclusion of strikes against military targets that could either seriously degrade or critically complicate the enemy’s implementation of its nuclear operations. For instance, even though urban centers might remain as the main targets, some critical nodes of the enemy’s nuclear operations such as Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (C4ISR) centers could be targeted as well in order to prevent the enemy from carrying out their nuclear operations. The strategic ambiguity here is intentional but we should highlight that a mix of both urban and military targets will require investments in Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) for engagement with fleeting targets or even HUMINT intelligence for the location of critical nodes in the adversary’s nuclear arsenal. The intentional ambiguity notwithstanding, a more expansive countervalue targeting policy is within current capabilities and in harmony with France’s nuclear doctrinal tradition.

Forward Deterrence: What It Encompasses & Why the Conventional Pillar Should Be Highlighted

But what does forward deterrence really mean and how does it translate into actual domains of cooperation? For now, the term is the overarching concept under which a number of activities will take place: joint exercises, signaling during crisis, deployment of French strategic aircraft (FAS) on allied territory leveraging the strategic depth of the European continent in order to disperse nuclear platforms and increase their survivability. The deployment of French strategic forces on allied territory will be under specific circumstances (circonstancielle) which alludes to crises, but the French President refrained from being more specific, which could give room for alternative interpretations.

The most important part -the actual cornerstone of France’s forward defense posture one could argue- is the cooperation of all partners on conventional support for nuclear operations; something that is known amongst NATO partners as CNSO (Conventional Support of Nuclear Operations). Conventional support is broken down into three pillars: a. the creation of Early Warning capabilities for the detection of incoming ballistic missiles b. missile and drone defense and c. conventional deep strike capabilities. It needs to be highlighted that even though the speech has been about upgrading Europe’s nuclear deterrent, the conventional component should be regarded as equally important. The creation of a small group of partners who will exchange knowledge, experiences, technical and scientific know-how on ISR or deep strike capabilities has the potential of spilling over towards the creation of a tight network of capabilities across the kill chain. Cooperation on Early Warning systems through ISR collaboration and intelligence sharing is the first step towards the creation of a network where the sensors will send real time information to Command & Control Centers (C2) for information processing and then straight to interceptors for missile or drone defense. Successful deep strike capabilities are also dependent on intelligence sharing and collaboration on ISR which further intensifies the need for flawless cooperation through interconnectivity and interoperability. Put differently, conventional deterrence is the pillar of a credible nuclear deterrence. If preparations for conventional operations are carried out successfully, then the whole effort has the potential of ‘locking’ states into a web of interconnectivity and deep leveled cooperation where absolute synchronization along the kill chain will have the potential to increase lethality and military effectiveness in the theater of operations. In a nutshell, even though Macron’s speech was, prima facie, about nuclear deterrence, if one scratches beneath the surface, the project has important potential for enhancing cooperation in the conventional domain and, in specific, in three fields that are of paramount importance for future warfare.

Lastly, something that we need to keep in mind; President Macron called the initiative a work in progress (démarche progressive). This gives the impression that the cooperation scheme that France has put forward under its leadership is a malleable structure where partners can shape their own contribution based on what it is that they are willing to offer and how they want to benefit from their participation. Joint exercises, deployments of FAS Rafales abroad and the conventional coordination for nuclear operations are just the starting points. Within the context of this smaller group of European partners, collective action should be easier and cooperation prospects promise to be more dynamic. The bilateral deliberations will continue, and it remains to be seen how each partner will shape its participation and contribute to the scheme.

The Enemy Within: Lack of Nuclear Strategy Expertise When it is Most Needed

After the end of the Cold War, nuclear weapons scored very low on countries’ lists of priorities and nuclear expertise was no longer needed. From the ‘90s onwards, we saw the golden age of arms control where the emphasis was put on technical knowledge for supporting the treaty verification regimes. The nuclear shadow over world politics faded away and gave its position to optimism about the future of humanity away from the prospect of a nuclear conflagration. And yet, sadly, nuclear weapons are back to haunt inter-state relations and all the expertise that was dismantled needs to be rebuilt while taking into account both traditional theories and models but also, and most critically, the new features of our current international environment.

Therefore, while Europe takes its nuclear deterrent more seriously and policy makers continue bilateral deliberations towards new concepts and postures, it is paradoxical that the biggest enemy of a credible European nuclear deterrent is not Russia’s or China’s nuclear arsenals but the wider lack of nuclear strategy expertise within a shrinking nuclear policy community. The nuclear bomb is above everything else a strategic weapon which implies that more involvement by educated and informed civilians is necessary. We need an active and dynamic nuclear policy community to serve two goals: a. work in tandem with governmental institutions, brainstorm and provide innovative ideas to decision makers and b. hold policy makers accountable pushing states towards responsible nuclear policies that avoid unnecessary risks.

Taking a step further, we need to leverage new knowledge on nuclear strategy apart from the traditional theories. After the end of the Cold War, access to archival data in the US, Russia and Europe led to the production of a big volume of knowledge in Cold War nuclear history, nuclear cultures and the diversity in state views with regard to the requirements of a credible deterrent. Modern nuclear policies need to be informed by and learn from Cold War events and the experiences nuclear powers had to go through. At the same time, apart from looking back into historical lessons, we need to keep our eyes open for the particularities of our strategic environment such as the emergence of new technologies and their impact on nuclear postures, strategy and doctrines. New technologies create the illusion of escalation control breathing fresh air into damage limitation and nuclear warfighting doctrines that, however, increase the chance nuclear use in the future. This creates a strategic environment that is even more complex and challenging that the Cold War one. For all these reasons, we need experts from a diversity of fields to voice new ideas and share their expertise with governmental organizations supporting them in their critical mission of nuclear deterrence in this very challenging strategic environment.

Any attempt to build a credible European deterrent will be incomplete if it is not married to an investment in the intellectual capital of a wider nuclear policy community that will serve as the free market where ideas will circulate, policies will be discussed, critiqued, legitimized or rejected. A nuclear policy community that will serve as the bridge between decision makers and the public opinion that needs to remain informed and part of the wider discussion. President Macron and partner states did the first step towards a credible European nuclear deterrent. For this effort to be sustained, we now need to start working on building the intellectual capacity that will underpin Europe’s nuclear peace.

 

The M23, which controls the coltan-rich area, has not commented and the death toll is hard to verify.

La Commission souhaite promouvoir les aliments biologiques et locaux dans les marchés publics

The post La campagne de l’UE en faveur de cantines durables risque de susciter une réaction hostile aux légumes appeared first on Euractiv FR.

Les musulmans qui effectuent le pèlerinage de la Oumra en Arabie saoudite pendant le mois de ramadan sont dans l'incertitude quant à l'impact de la guerre sur leur voyage. Alors que la guerre se poursuit et que certaines compagnies aériennes transportant des passagers ont suspendu leurs vols par mesure de prudence, ceci affecte la Oumra Ramadan en cours.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez reiterated his "No to war in Iran!" in a televised address on Wednesday. The day before, US President Donald Trump had strongly criticised Spain in the presence of German Chancellor Friedrich Merz for refusing to allow the US to use two military bases on its territory and threatened to sever trade relations with Spain. Commentators take stock of the leaders' behaviour in this delicate situation.

In reaction to ongoing strikes, Iran has fired missiles and drones at Israel, US bases in the region and targets in its wealthy Gulf neighbour states. However, most of the projectiles have been intercepted. Turkey has said it shot down a missile that was apparently aimed at Cyprus. The Gulf states' relations with the Tehran on the one hand, and with Washington and Tel Aviv on the other are becoming increasingly complex.

Stéphane Séjourné, EU Commissioner for Prosperity and Industrial Strategy, has presented a plan to boost demand for European products. It sets out new rules for public procurement under which EU member states will only be allowed to provide public funding for key industries if the products, including steel, cement, electric vehicles and clean technologies, are "Made in Europe".