{"id":327320,"date":"2026-05-25T07:24:45","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T07:24:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=327320"},"modified":"2026-05-27T07:44:19","modified_gmt":"2026-05-27T07:44:19","slug":"france-wants-to-join-british-german-long-range-missile-project","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=327320","title":{"rendered":"France wants to join British-German long-range missile project"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ilsole24ore.com \u2013 May 22, 2026 AI Translation<\/strong><\/h1>\n

France<\/strong> intends to join an Anglo-German plan<\/strong> for the production of new long-range missiles<\/strong>. This was exclusively reported by the Financial Times<\/em>. Paris has expressed its interest in participating in the long-range precision strike programme of Berlin and London<\/a>, in a move that is part of a broader French-German defence dialogue<\/strong>. The three countries hope to hold trilateral talks on the subject in early June.<\/p>\n

The programme, announced by the UK and Germany<\/strong> in 2024 as the spearhead<\/strong> of their defence agreement, aims to produce a family of advanced land-based missiles with a range of over 2,000 km<\/strong>, capable of hitting military targets within Russian territory<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The issue took on new urgency after Donald Trump<\/strong> cancelled plans to deploy a battalion equipped with Tomahawk missiles<\/strong> and other long-range weapons at a US base in western Germany. The project, dating back to the Biden era<\/strong>, had been conceived as a temporary solution while waiting for Europe to develop its long-range precision strike capabilities.<\/p>\n

A weakness of European armies<\/strong><\/h2>\n

European nations possess some conventional missiles with a range of about 300 km<\/strong> or more, but these are almost exclusively launched from aircraft or ships<\/strong>. This means that European fighters, warships or submarines would have to enter disputed waters or airspace to strike targets deep inside Russian territory.<\/p>\n

But Moscow’s extensive use of land-launched missiles<\/strong> in Ukraine<\/strong>, as well as the deployment of long-range weapons in the Kaliningrad<\/strong> enclave on the Baltic Sea, has prompted European nations to seek to develop similar capabilities in the hope of helping to deter Russian aggression.<\/p>\n

Paris’s interest also reflects President Emmanuel Macron<\/strong>‘s growing conviction that the development of advanced conventional weapons would be a valuable complement to France’s nuclear deterrent<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Paris again concerned<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Although France had initially been involved in talks with Germany and the UK to collaborate on the development of a long-range strike capability<\/strong>, Paris had later backed out due to the ongoing debate over its nuclear doctrine.<\/p>\n

In a speech in March 2025, Macron outlined how France could implicitly protect its neighbours with its nuclear deterrent<\/strong>, announcing talks with six countries willing to participate, including Germany. However, he also emphasised the importance of long-range missiles<\/strong>, air defence<\/strong> and surveillance<\/strong> to manage escalation “before the nuclear threshold is crossed”.<\/p>\n

French officials concluded that joining the Anglo-German programme would help ‘reduce the gap<\/strong>‘ between conventional and nuclear deterrence.<\/p>\n

The Anglo-German long-range precision strike proposal, which is part of the six-country project known as Elsa<\/strong>, still remains at the conceptual stage. The two countries have agreed to include in the programme stealth cruise missiles and hypersonic weapons<\/strong> that travel at very high speeds on unpredictable trajectories, making them difficult to track. The initial focus will be on ground-launched systems.<\/p>\n

The companies involved<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Among the companies involved in the Anglo-German discussions are the pan-European missile manufacturer Mbda<\/strong> and the Anglo-German start-up Hypersonics<\/strong>, which announced in February that it had become the first privately owned European defence company to successfully complete a hypersonic test flight<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Paris proposes that ArianeGroup<\/strong>, jointly owned by the European aerospace group Airbus<\/strong> and France’s Safran<\/strong>, could join the programme to provide carrier rockets capable of launching hypersonic weapons into the Earth’s atmosphere. Ariane currently produces the M51 ballistic missile for the French nuclear programme.<\/p>\n

French officials believe that their involvement in the programme could accelerate<\/strong> the development of the new long-range missiles, which, according to the UK and Germany, are expected to enter service in the early 2030s<\/strong> and will be among the most advanced missile systems ever designed. Macron had hinted that he was interested in joining the Anglo-German programme, explicitly citing the two countries as partners<\/strong> with whom he wishes to collaborate in the development of advanced long-range weapons. “This will offer new options for conventional escalation<\/strong> at a time when adversaries are deploying new technologies and weapons,” he said.<\/p>\n

A joint Franco-German statement, published after the speech, also pledged to develop capabilities that include precision deep-sea attacks.<\/p>\n

German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius<\/strong> gave the first explicit acknowledgement of French interest in the Anglo-German programme earlier this month, stating: ‘Now the French want to join us, and do it as soon as possible.<\/p>\n

Berlin’s OK, London’s doubts<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Berlin welcomes the accession of Paris with enthusiasm. In London, however, there is some apprehension among some officials about the possibility of France joining a project that has been discussed with Berlin for more than 18 months.<\/p>\n

Some fear that the entry of a new partner with its own weapon concepts, as well as its own industrial interests in the defence sector, could debilitate<\/strong> the project. A number of Franco-German defence collaborations have failed due to political and industrial tensions, including the project to build a joint combat aircraft<\/strong> under the Fcas programme, which is on the verge of collapse.<\/p>\n

However, the UK and France together successfully developed the Storm Shadow\/Scalp<\/strong> missile, which entered service in the 2000s.<\/p>\n

Together with Germany, the three countries represent the largest economic and military powers in Europe and have a long history of cooperation on national security issues.<\/p>\n

Source\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Paris has expressed interest in participating in Berlin and London’s long-range precision strike programme. The three countries hope to work on a program to develop long-range missiles capable of striking deep within Russia<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-327320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-Current_Affairs"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327320","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=327320"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327320\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":327321,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327320\/revisions\/327321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=327320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=327320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=327320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}