Europe must turn its focus to long-term strategic thinking, including creating deep-strike capabilities and assessing how France's nuclear deterrent can fit into the bloc's future security architecture, France's president has said.
Speaking at the Munich Security Conference on Friday, President Emmanuel Macron dismissed accusations that Europe was decaying and defended its push to tackle disinformation and the excesses of social media that were harming Western countries.
"This is the right time for audacity. This is the right time for a strong Europe," Macron said. "Europe has to learn to become a geopolitical power. It was not part of our DNA."
In an apparent swipe at the US trade and foreign policy towards Europe, Macron said that Europeans must show the world “our unwavering commitment to defend our own interests.”
“It starts, of course, with continuing to extend our support to Ukraine, but it could nicely follow with fanning off unjustified tariffs and politely declining unjustified claims on European territory. This is what we did and this is what we will [continue to] do,” he added.
“Reshuffle and reorganise”
The French President added that Europeans must start this work with their own thinking and their own interests.
“So my proposal today is to launch a series of consultations on this important issue, which we have started to flesh out with our British and German colleagues, but in the broader European consultation with all the colleagues here, with a lot of capacities, a lot of strategic thinking," he said.
Macron, who is scheduled to deliver a speech later this month on how he sees the role of France's nuclear deterrent within Europe, said he had started those consultations.
"We have to reshuffle and reorganise our architecture of security in Europe. Because the past architecture of security was totally designed and framed during Cold War times. So it's no longer adapted," he said.
"We have to rearticulate nuclear deterrence in this approach," he said.
