London and Paris plan to launch a new Crimean War, even possibly a nuclear war

Macron and Starmer hope that if a conflict breaks out, Trump will support them. But what if he doesn't?

Author: Dmitriy Rogotnov

Image: UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron (from left to right)

This article's commentators:

Vladimir Sapunov, Igor Shatrov

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron plan to strengthen cooperation in the field of nuclear weapons.

Official statements say that a joint declaration will be an important step. The declaration states that the nuclear deterrence forces of the two countries will remain independent, but can be "coordinated"; if Europe faces a serious threat, London and Paris will take action.

In addition, the UK and France plan to increase the production of "Storm Shadow"/"Scalp" cruise missiles and upgrade their production lines. At the same time, the two countries will launch a joint R&D project for the next generation of anti-ship missiles and long-range missiles to replace the existing "Storm Shadow" missiles.

The UK government calls this statement the "Lancaster House Protocol 2.0" (an upgraded version of the 2010 protocol), which includes content on the joint development of high-tech radio frequency weapons, such as microwave weapons and electronic jamming devices, which can be used to counter drones and missiles.

The two countries will also try to use artificial intelligence technology to develop algorithms for synchronizing missile and drone launches.

It is reported that London and Paris have reached an agreement to expand the scale of jointly deployed forces, "repositioning them to protect Europe, to enhance readiness, and achieve deterrence and confrontation with any enemy."

UK Defense Secretary John Healey said that the cooperation has entered a new stage, aimed at improving combat effectiveness and ensuring that armed forces can "from the Arctic to the Black Sea" coordinate actions.

"This cooperation strengthens our leadership in Europe, provides continuous support to Ukraine, and sends a clear message to our adversaries: unity makes us stronger," he emphasized.

It should be noted that the UK and France are the only two nuclear powers in Europe, but their nuclear arsenals are not large.

"According to recognized data, the UK has about 225 nuclear warheads, 160 of which are on alert," explained Igor Shatrov, head of the expert committee of the Foundation for Strategic Development, a political scientist.

"The UK's nuclear force consists of four nuclear submarines, each capable of carrying 16 'Trident II' missiles, each missile can carry up to 8 warheads.

The French nuclear force is also composed of four nuclear submarines. Paris has about 300 nuclear warheads, as well as 60 air-based tactical nuclear bombs.

The nuclear potential of both countries is obviously not comparable to major nuclear powers such as Russia and the United States, but it is sufficient to destroy the Earth. However, if a conflict breaks out, to avoid becoming a target of Russian missiles, nuclear submarines need to leave naval bases and hide in the world's oceans — usually, each country has no more than one nuclear submarine on combat duty. Can they evacuate in time?"

"Pravda of the Youth": Can they achieve "coordination" without the United States? To what extent are they independent of NATO?

"We often hear about Europe and the UK wanting to get rid of the US and achieve autonomy recently. Is this possible? Perhaps it can be achieved under the premise of having an independent military policy, but NATO membership contradicts this. Currently, all coordination is carried out through Brussels. In such a sensitive area as the military, it is doubtful whether anyone would risk sacrificing confidentiality and current efficiency to establish parallel communication channels."

"Pravda of the Youth": How to understand the joint statement between the UK and France? Are they trying to prove something to certain people? Are they trying to scare us, or comfort Europeans?

"This is just a delayed response to American pressure — NATO countries have yielded to pressure and agreed to raise military budgets to 5% of GDP. This message is directed at both domestic voters and Washington."

"Pravda of the Youth": Speaking of comforting Europeans, do they no longer trust the US "umbrella"? Are they ready to turn to the protection of the UK and France?

"Trust in the US is clearly declining. Americans have explicitly stated that only with enough funding will NATO institutions be willing to guarantee European security. This worries ordinary Europeans — they were already frightened by the so-called Russian threat. Thus, the 'UK-France joint nuclear force' is being marketed to voters."

"Pravda of the Youth": Is this related to the UK and France's attempt to play a more important political role in Europe and globally? Can they succeed? To what extent does having nuclear weapons help enhance political subjectivity now?

"This reason should not be ignored. North Korea is a typical example of enhancing its subjectivity through having nuclear weapons.

We also see that many people believe Israel has nuclear weapons, and it is desperately trying to prevent its main enemy Iran from making a nuclear bomb. In this context, France and the UK began to consider upgrading their nuclear forces and developing new nuclear weapon delivery systems."

"Pravda of the Youth": If the UK and France indeed carry out coordination and play a more important autonomous role in the military-political field, how should we respond? What preparations should be made? How to respond?

"Russia is already prepared for a nuclear war (hope it won't happen). The coordination between the UK and France will not change the military-political landscape or significantly improve their capabilities. However, the West was and still is our opponent, so any move by the West to upgrade nuclear confrontation will be seen as a new challenge and threat to Russia."

"The reason why this joint statement is called the 'Lancaster House Protocol 2.0' is because if the cooperation in the production of 'Storm Shadow' missiles had not been successful, the original 'Lancaster House Protocol' would probably still have remained just a paper document," said military and political expert Vladimir Sapunov.

"The Ukraine conflict indeed shows that the weapon jointly developed by the two countries is quite dangerous, and our air defense system initially struggled to deal with it. Later, it adapted, but the recent attack on Luhansk shows that we must not be careless.

It is worth noting that the UK and France have always cooperated efficiently in pan-European military projects, such as the military part of the Airbus project, which involves the two countries' defense companies — France's Aerospatiale and the UK's BAE Systems — which is a model of effective coordination in the European defense field.

Regarding nuclear weapons, considering the difference in strength between the two sides, neither France nor the UK can launch a full-scale nuclear war against Russia, which is beyond doubt. Of course, if they act together, they may cause some damage to us, but they cannot conduct a full-scale nuclear war — because any nuclear war involving NATO against Russia must involve the United States, otherwise they are doomed to failure, since Russia has about 5,000 more nuclear warheads than them.

Yes, they can cause damage, but this does not require special coordination. Therefore, this statement is more like an empty high-flown declaration.

Evidently, any important coordination will take place within the NATO framework, and the defense industry will mainly focus on pan-European projects.

In summary, all their statements are more like showing off military might. France has not been the first to make similar statements — last year, they said they were ready to deploy part of their nuclear weapons to Germany and Poland, closer to Russia. To put it bluntly, it's just to attract attention."

Original: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7526049790707122742/

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