5d ago

Macron says he will 'open debate' on using French nuclear deterrence to protect Europe

www.lemonde.fr Macron proposes French nuclear extension, Ukraine troop deployment in case of ceasefire

In a televised address to the French on Wednesday, the French president described Russia as a 'threat to France and Europe,' and said he wanted to confer with European allies on using France's nuclear deterrent to protect Europe.

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He said a lot of other good stuff too IMO.
Finally someone taking the russian and slso the american threat seriously.
- UK has typically bowed to US.
  France may our only Security Council Veto hope.
  
  Bowed? I think its more of a strategy, to try to win the Americans back, act as a bridge. IMO it is too late. But even if it is only a 1% chance, its worth it. Meanwhile UK is investing in defense, standing by allies and being unwavering in its support for Ukraine.
  
  UK isn't in the EU anyway

I would definitely be in favor of France taking the US's place on the world stage. They're a more appropriate leader of the free world anyway
- Hm, I don’t think there’s such a thing as an “appropriate leader of the free world”. (Not even talking about how problematic the notion of “the free world” is.) We’re in this mess because one country has this much power over the rest of us. Replacing it with another (I’m saying this hypothetically, because France is in no position to gain as much power as the US anyway) doesn’t solve the problem.
  Also, and I’m saying this as a French person, France has its issues, even though they’re not as cataclysmically bad as the United States’s problems right now. The far right is getting a lot stronger here too (as in many other countries) and I’m frankly worried about the future. Many people here are fighting against this, and I hope we can turn the tide somehow, but... never depend on one country.
  
  Yeah, 2 countries should be world leaders. Moldova and Romania
- Last time France got to be a superpower they enslaved the west of Africa.
  
  Yep, and while we did progress from the mindset of that time, I don’t think we made as much progress as we should have, and the recent political atmosphere is... worrying. I mean, I don’t think we would enslave Africa again, but I shudder to think of what a superpower with our far right as its head would do. Also, superpowers are intrinsically dangerous, imho.
- can it be literally anyone else please? I worry that if the French get any more pompous they'll explode so fiercely that we won't need any nuclear weapons
  
  LePen's party is on the cusp of taking the presidency.
  It's crazy to see anymore excited about a more militant French government.

I know he did some shitty stuff domestically, but hes one of the biggest eurobros.
- Agreed. I'd like to see him in Von der Leyen's job once she's out.
  
  I can't take her seriously, the EU needs a strong face and she's not doing it for me. This isn't a woman VS man thing, I thought Merkel was tougher than Scholz to be fair.
- I read this as euroboros, and now I'm trying to imagine a European snake eating its own tail..,
- i meeeeean idk much about french politics, but from everything i heard the biggest shit show was the pension thing, and that was more an individuals being annoyed about getting less, but the pension situation was unsustainable so they either do something or it all imploded and macron tried to do something and people hated it because it effected them personally but now they’ve still got to deal with it and it’s just getting worse?
  
  He's consistently been the president of the wealthy, he could have chosen to make wealthy pensioners take some of the financial burden but decided to put it all on the working population.
  He also deleted a wealth tax, consistently slashed benefits for unemployment and social minimums.
  On a personal level, he's had too many dealings with quite a few people implicated in criminal scandals (Sarkozy, notably) to be clean.
  All that to say, I can appreciate his talks about Europe, but he's not been a good president for the french workers, and it's likely to lead to the far right being in control in a couple years, which could be a disaster for said European project.
  
  that was more an individuals being annoyed about getting less
  Not, that was about Macron trampling on the democratic process to pass a controversial law. (And yes, things needed to be adjusted with the pension system, but it didn’t have to be done this specific way, there were several options besides the one His Highness Macron curtly chose for all of us. It also didn’t need to be done that urgently.) Also, for some of these individuals, “getting less” will, concretely, mean “dying before reaching retirement age” or “falling into poverty because their company or their health won’t let them work until retirement age”, so I think it’s a bit unfair to present it like you do, as if it were mere discontentment over getting slightly less than they were hoping for.

Provide cover to Greenland.

They should oopsie whoopsie give Ukraine one. Seems fair since Ukraine only gave theirs up in exchange for American protection.
- Just having one would be more dangerous then having none. It's not enough for actual deterrence but it is enough for Russia to "justify" using its arsenal against them.
  
  Oops, here's a couple dozen, looks like we mistakenly labeled a shipment.
  
  Trying to imagine doing the Cuban Missile Crisis but we're replacing Castro, Kennedy, and Khrushchev with Zelenskyy, Macron, and Putin.
  What could go wrong?
- Say it fell out of the plane.
  The Americans have lost a few over the years.

Nothing has to change as long as France is willing to end the world for Finland and Russia believes they'll do it.

Us too plz?
I'm sure we'll give you guys whatever you want in return, shit's getting really scary here in Canada.
- We have a good chunk of the technology. We should eventually build our own. After all, India built their nuclear weapons from Canadian tech.
  On May 18, 1974, India shocked the world by conducting a test A-Bomb explosion it called 'Smiling Buddha. ' The nuclear explosive was plutonium, obtained from a 'peaceful' research reactor – a gift from the Canadian government in 1956.
  
  Yeah, but proliferation is bad, basically. The more nations have nukes the harder it is to not use them.
  That being said, we already have the CANDU reactors in Ontario churning out plutonium that we just bury. I've heard it estimated we could have bombs in like 3 months if we wanted.
- They'll take Quebec off you.
  
  Not as big an ask as you're probably thinking. In the end, they've always (just barely) voted to stay for the convenience. If we were to join the Schengen area and the single market going forward, and maybe even the EU itself, it wouldn't really be a problem if they were technically a separate nation within it.
  It was a "shotgun marriage" by the colonial British in the first place, and as far as I can tell enthusiasm for the arrangement was never that high among ordinary Anglo Canadians, either. I hear "they should just leave so we never have to talk about it again" semi-often IRL.

All these tuff guys had 3 years to do something and they just sat back and counted their money.

I thought they already had a warning shot doctrine.
https://youtu.be/gFmuj7E5GwA
- Also, Putin has been sabre-rattling for years, so the debate has kind of already been ongoing.

Frogs being based as always.

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