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Without in any way indulging in the delusion of a united Europe, in which Germany is willing to subordinate itself to France, one thing is worth saying: The UK

Without in any way indulging in the delusion of a united Europe, in which Germany is willing to subordinate itself to France, one thing is worth saying: The UK does have a nuclear arsenal, but it's essentially leased from the US.

JumpCrisscross 2y ago
> in the delusion of a united Europe, in which Germany is willing to subordinate itself to France The Haudenosaunee a/k/a Iroquois had a unique confederacy consisting of two dominant and a few lesser powers [1][2]. And the Roman Republic had two consuls, including on campaign. Maybe a nuclear command inspired by both is the answer: any launch requires codes from each of Paris, Berlin and the head of state of the country actually launching. (Practically, the Germans are sort of irrelevant given they not only have no nuclear weapons, they’re also dismantling their civil nuclear expertise. I’m assuming they grow up and reärm. Otherwise, centralising nuclear power in Paris doesn’t depend on Germany agreement.) [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iroquois https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iroquois [2] https://youtu.be/S4gU2Tsv6hY https://youtu.be/S4gU2Tsv6hY
- EA-3167 2y ago
  The Germans have the money, the largest GDP in the EU and France is a distant second (would be third if you counted the UK though). At the end of the day there is no EU without Germany, and as we've seen with Ukraine, waging a war without funds is like trying to breathe in a vacuum.
  - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
    > Germans have the money, the largest GDP in the EU and France is a distant second For nuclear purposes Germany is irrelevant. For martial purposes, it’s a distant second to France. It obviously should be part of mutual-defence discussions. But it doesn’t need to be and doesn’t bring that much to the table in the short term. (Absent a hypothetical land war.)
    - EA-3167 2y ago
      Again, when we're talking about warfare, there is a strong economic and industrial dimension. Unless the scope of your warfare is limited to extremely fatalistic worst-case scenarios. Russia was on the ropes in many ways because of the cost of the war they're waging, while Ukraine was in a stronger position because of aid and promises of future rebuilding investment. If push comes to shove and there's a European conflict, Germany has a (horrifically) proven track record of war production. I'm also baffled by the claim that Germany is a distant second to France in terms of military. Germany doesn't have any need for a carrier because they don't have colonies/former colonies they want to "work with". Germany does however spend more than twice what France does on their military budget, although in GDP terms France spends more... alas France has a much smaller GDP. Germany has a slightly smaller military force, but only about 19k or so.
      - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
        > Unless the scope of your warfare is limited to extremely fatalistic worst-case scenarios Within the context of the French nuclear umbrella there are two questions: strategic nuclear deterrence and everything else. Germany is useless for the former. It's important, but not critical, for the latter. > baffled by the claim that Germany is a distant second to France in terms of military Their force projection is limited. They're absolutely going to strengthen any alliance they join. But outside a conventional proxy war of attrition with the U.S. or China, they're not strictly necessary. (And could be a net negative due to their politics.)
      - Vilian 2y ago
        Don't matter if they spend twice the money on military if that money don't return, France has aircraft programs nuclear programs etc while spending half what Germany do
TheAlchemist 2y ago
Exactly. And in these wild times, one realize that being dependent on the US, is no longer a viable path forward. It's quite similar actually to Germany's dependence on Russian gas. It was all self inflicted (nobody seem to remember the corrupt German politicians, that all went to work for Gazprom and co...).
t_mann 2y ago
Without knowing anything about the arrangement, I would assume that as far as these matters are concerned, whoever controls the launch button effectively owns the thing. Those things are made exactly for the kind of situations where treaties aren't enough.
- dragonwriter 2y ago
  In the short term, that's true. If they can't independently maintain the weapons, it ceases to be true beyond the short term, though. OTOH, my understanding is that that is not a problem for the UK; they don't “essentially lease” their arsenal from the US; they use domestically developed and maintained warheads on purchased-from-the-US but locally-maintained Trident missiles carried by UK-built-and-maintained subs. They might have some uphill work if they wanted major delivery system upgrades, but their existing arsenal is, AFAIK, functionally independent of an ongoing dependence on the US.
rich_sasha 2y ago
I wonder how it works in practice. I share the scepticism that the UK can fire these independently. But then, from a purely technical PoV, you'd imagine these missiles can be fired: - from underwater, away from radio reception - as a second strike weapon, i.e. with command centres destroyed So here's the dichotomy. If these assumptions hold, then the UK must be able to fire the missiles independently - they seem to work offline. And if they don't, then they are even more useless than I thought. Essentially they would only be good for a first strike, approved by the US, or second strike in a sub-global conflict, not even for a NATO-wide defence in an all-out war. I can't see a third way. Maybe US satellites which would diffuse a Trident in-flight if the US says so?
- qingcharles 2y ago
  You make a good point about them being underwater and having to function offline. I could see them having some sort of DRM "license key" that only gives, say, a 90 day window before it has to be renewed for the missiles to function.

JumpCrisscross 2y ago

> in the delusion of a united Europe, in which Germany is willing to subordinate itself to France The Haudenosaunee a/k/a Iroquois had a unique confederacy consisting of two dominant and a few lesser powers [1][2]. And the Roman Republic had two consuls, including on campaign. Maybe a nuclear command inspired by both is the answer: any launch requires codes from each of Paris, Berlin and the head of state of the country actually launching. (Practically, the Germans are sort of irrelevant given they not only have no nuclear weapons, they’re also dismantling their civil nuclear expertise. I’m assuming they grow up and reärm. Otherwise, centralising nuclear power in Paris doesn’t depend on Germany agreement.) [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iroquois https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iroquois [2] https://youtu.be/S4gU2Tsv6hY https://youtu.be/S4gU2Tsv6hY

EA-3167 2y ago
The Germans have the money, the largest GDP in the EU and France is a distant second (would be third if you counted the UK though). At the end of the day there is no EU without Germany, and as we've seen with Ukraine, waging a war without funds is like trying to breathe in a vacuum.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > Germans have the money, the largest GDP in the EU and France is a distant second For nuclear purposes Germany is irrelevant. For martial purposes, it’s a distant second to France. It obviously should be part of mutual-defence discussions. But it doesn’t need to be and doesn’t bring that much to the table in the short term. (Absent a hypothetical land war.)
  - EA-3167 2y ago
    Again, when we're talking about warfare, there is a strong economic and industrial dimension. Unless the scope of your warfare is limited to extremely fatalistic worst-case scenarios. Russia was on the ropes in many ways because of the cost of the war they're waging, while Ukraine was in a stronger position because of aid and promises of future rebuilding investment. If push comes to shove and there's a European conflict, Germany has a (horrifically) proven track record of war production. I'm also baffled by the claim that Germany is a distant second to France in terms of military. Germany doesn't have any need for a carrier because they don't have colonies/former colonies they want to "work with". Germany does however spend more than twice what France does on their military budget, although in GDP terms France spends more... alas France has a much smaller GDP. Germany has a slightly smaller military force, but only about 19k or so.
    - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
      > Unless the scope of your warfare is limited to extremely fatalistic worst-case scenarios Within the context of the French nuclear umbrella there are two questions: strategic nuclear deterrence and everything else. Germany is useless for the former. It's important, but not critical, for the latter. > baffled by the claim that Germany is a distant second to France in terms of military Their force projection is limited. They're absolutely going to strengthen any alliance they join. But outside a conventional proxy war of attrition with the U.S. or China, they're not strictly necessary. (And could be a net negative due to their politics.)
    - Vilian 2y ago
      Don't matter if they spend twice the money on military if that money don't return, France has aircraft programs nuclear programs etc while spending half what Germany do

TheAlchemist 2y ago

Exactly. And in these wild times, one realize that being dependent on the US, is no longer a viable path forward. It's quite similar actually to Germany's dependence on Russian gas. It was all self inflicted (nobody seem to remember the corrupt German politicians, that all went to work for Gazprom and co...).

t_mann 2y ago

Without knowing anything about the arrangement, I would assume that as far as these matters are concerned, whoever controls the launch button effectively owns the thing. Those things are made exactly for the kind of situations where treaties aren't enough.

dragonwriter 2y ago
In the short term, that's true. If they can't independently maintain the weapons, it ceases to be true beyond the short term, though. OTOH, my understanding is that that is not a problem for the UK; they don't “essentially lease” their arsenal from the US; they use domestically developed and maintained warheads on purchased-from-the-US but locally-maintained Trident missiles carried by UK-built-and-maintained subs. They might have some uphill work if they wanted major delivery system upgrades, but their existing arsenal is, AFAIK, functionally independent of an ongoing dependence on the US.

rich_sasha 2y ago

I wonder how it works in practice. I share the scepticism that the UK can fire these independently. But then, from a purely technical PoV, you'd imagine these missiles can be fired: - from underwater, away from radio reception - as a second strike weapon, i.e. with command centres destroyed So here's the dichotomy. If these assumptions hold, then the UK must be able to fire the missiles independently - they seem to work offline. And if they don't, then they are even more useless than I thought. Essentially they would only be good for a first strike, approved by the US, or second strike in a sub-global conflict, not even for a NATO-wide defence in an all-out war. I can't see a third way. Maybe US satellites which would diffuse a Trident in-flight if the US says so?

qingcharles 2y ago
You make a good point about them being underwater and having to function offline. I could see them having some sort of DRM "license key" that only gives, say, a 90 day window before it has to be renewed for the missiles to function.