Originally appeared at ZeroHedge
Just days after first the United States and then Russia announced they would abandon the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty (or INF), which for decades had kept Europe free of the threat of intermediate-range nuclear weapons, on Monday the French Air Force successfully conducted a nuclear strike mission, sending aircraft on an 11-hour mission to sneak a nuclear-capable cruise missile through simulated enemy air defenses and nail it into the sands of a test range south of Bordeaux, Defense News reported.
The February 4 mission, which was billed by the Armed Forces Ministry of the NATO member as “operation-representative,” featured a Rafale fighter jet releasing an MBDA made ASMP-A missile. Officials designed the drill to include “all phases characteristic of a nuclear-dissuasion mission,” including successive refueling by C-135 and A-330 tankers before aiming the missile – without a nuclear warhead – at a missile test area near the town of Biscarrosse.
“This success reinforces the technical and operational credibility of the deterrence that the airborne component has continuously maintained through the Air Force since 1964,” read an Armed Forces Ministry statement from Feb. 5.
A Dassault Aviation Rafale jet performs during the International Paris Air Show in Le Bourget near Paris on June 23, 2017.
Besides its aerial deterrence leg – which was on full display this Monday and supposedly meant to send a clear signal to the Kremlin even though it was the Trump administration which started the latest nuclear arms race by first pulling out of the INF – the French military has submarines capable of firing nuclear-tipped missiles.
Amusingly, in an effort to counter the appearance of a retaliatory move aimed at Russia which will any minute conduct its own nuclear strike test, and so on as the new Cold War escalates in tit-for-tat fashion, the French ministry statement stressed that the test mission had been long planned.
“There is no reason to believe that the timing of the test due to anything other operational or technical reasons,” agreed Bruno Tertrais, deputy director of the Fondation pour la Recherche Strategique think tank in Paris, claiming such similar tests occur roughly once per year. Surely
“The alternative would have been to cancel the test for fear that it was understood as response to INFT suspensions — that would have been fairly ridiculous,” Tertrais told Defense News, using shorthand for the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty.
And since it is “fairly ridiculous” to assume that any tactical nuclear drills by the Kremlin conducted in the coming days would be seen as retaliation to the suspension of the INF treaty, we fully expect Putin to conduct one or more such tests in the very near future, and eagerly look forward to NATO’s response.
The World shakes in it’s boots. Get lost frogs.
Don’t insult the French people for the actions of a bunch of Zionist rats and their Freemason puppets. The real French people are in the streets week after week protesting these same criminals. The French have so far shown more courage and determination than all the rest of Europe since the end of World War 2.
I applaud the french for this however too little too late it seems.
How is it “too late”? There are tens of millions of French people in France. Even if it takes a civil war they could fix most of their problems in one generation. It’s just a matter of how difficult and costly it will be.
It’s too late for this, the elites had too much time to prepare, this will not affect the fact that France will go to war on NATO’s side and be wiped out. The French should have done this when Sarkozy the Hungarian Jew was installed or even when the false flags started killing French citizens. There is a window of rebellion, if missed it becomes nearly impossible for this generation to free itself. They will do it but not now.
I disagree with you, there is no technology or power able to crush a mass uprising. If you want a live example going on right now take a look at Yemen. You have a bunch of poor sandal wearing farmers barely able to feed themselves armed with the most basic weaponry going up against the 4th highest military budget in the world armed with some of the latest military technology and equipment and yet they have successfully defended their position for years. Compared to the situation of the Yemeni people the French people are light years ahead. The only thing missing is the willpower.
Fine, disagree and I hope you are right but you will see that France will continue its current course, remember what I said.
I didn’t say it won’t, I just said it’s not too late to change. It’s just a matter of willpower.
Fair enough.
France,Brittan, Germany and Israel are unchecked in INF treaties. This countries also have dangerous weapons and nuclear weapons
Germany. Sure.
True, the agreement as only between the US and the USSR/Russia. The French could do the fuck whatever they wanted. And they have a long history of nuclear armed missiles carried by French air force jets. Hell, nuclear armed variants of new French aircraft always tended to enter service years before the conventional tactical ground attack version did.
Russia? FFS, Macron would be better off focusing on the real threat to his regime: French citizens. They’re getting ready to string his ass up from a gas station.
11 hour mission? France is already in nuclear winter when rafale will come back to land in an airport
and how is this with ruskie planes??
Plane will just take off and released kinzhal within a minute or just used icbm
The shit is coming down and the Russians are just sitting and waiting for the inevitable, so much for Putin’s if you know a fight is coming strike first and hard. More B.S. from a politician.
Raptar, Russia will never be that nation that ends the current human civilization on this planet (i.e. starting nuclear war). We would not strike first. We understand that this planet is way too small to survive such disaster. Yes, if the existence of Russia will be in danger than we will strike and we’ll strike hard. Hard enough to make sure that enemy is annihilated. Westerners (many of them) just don’t seem to understand this mentality. Nuclear war means end of civilization. We would not start it. But if someone starts it than “We’ll go to heaven as martyrs and they will simply croak:”(c) Rest assured that those cockroaches would not escape their fate.
Jesus said how bedtimes will be. No civilization can end human life.Only the devil a d false prophet will cause serious human destruction.
The Islamists will strike fast at the red sea it seems
I would disagree, it seems he has making so very heavy Bass Nuckles’s, shape shivs, and consealed under the big Russian Coat, shotguns to take to the Bar!
Hahaha! Wait till the Yellow Vests hear how their tax dollars are being wasted.
Tudor is right. There is no possible way to fight nuclear war without annihilating the developed world.
I think these sorts of drills simply remind all nuclear armed nations that the use of such weapons spells doomsday.
Why anyone needs reminding is the question. I grew up in US in the baby boom, born just four years after Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Throughout grade school, junior high and high school we were constantly anxious about nuclear annihilation. It seemed like we stepped back from that insanity after the fall of the Soviet Union, but it looks like we’re right back at it.
Not a INF treaty member but practice nuclear attack.