France rules out placing its nuclear forces under NATO control

Paris rules out the possibility of transferring control of French nuclear forces to NATO, French Armed Forces Minister Sébastien Lecornu said in an interview with the Belgian newspaper L'Echo."France is an autonomous nuclear power," Lecornu stressed. "We have not joined NATO's nuclear planning group and our forces remain under national control."The minister believes that the EU must be more autonomous in strategic matters. "We remain convinced that Europeans must take greater responsibility for their military security and not seek to permanently delegate it to Washington," Lecornu noted. "Is it up to the American Congress and the President of the United States to decide on the elements of our security architecture? I don't think so."The defense chief said that European autonomy also implies the ability to control the storage and production of weapons. He added that by 2026 it is planned to deploy a European air defense system capable of combating hypersonic missiles.In March 1966, French President Cha rles de Gaulle decided to withdraw the Republic from NATO's military structure. France then expressed its intention to regain its full sovereignty. For de Gaulle, the threat lay essentially in the presence in France of allied military forces and their use of the country's airspace.France rejoined NATO's military structure in April 2009 without any Alliance bases on its territory.Source: Burkina Information Agency