Merz opens the nuclear conversation Europe once preferred to avoid

Friedrich Merz went to Munich to argue that Europe still needs America. He also disclosed that Germany has started talking to France about nuclear deterrence.

The German chancellor’s announcement on 13 February gave a public political sponsor to a question that has become harder for European governments to dismiss: how much protection could France’s nuclear arsenal offer its neighbours if confidence in Washington continues to weaken?

Speaking at the opening of the Munich Security Conference, Merz said he had held preliminary discussions with President Emmanuel Macron. He placed them inside Germany’s existing obligations and NATO’s nuclear arrangements. He did not announce a German bomb, a shared launch authority or a replacement for the American guarantee.

Those qualifications were central to the announcement. Berlin is trying to widen its options without precipitating the rupture it fears. Paris is being invited to explain how a force built around national sovereignty might reassure countries whose security choices remain closely tied to the United States.

The immediate political backdrop was unusually sharp. Less than a month earlier, eight European governments had issued a joint statement backing Denmark and Greenland after Donald Trump threatened additional tariffs. The dispute brought the behaviour of an ally, rather than only the threat from Russia, into Europe’s security calculations.

At Munich, two propositions therefore occupied the same stage. Europe needed a more dependable ability to defend itself. It also needed the United States to remain engaged while that ability was being built. Merz’s nuclear disclosure exposed how difficult it will be to reconcile them.

The offer Paris has been waiting to discuss

Macron has not suddenly discovered a European role for French deterrence. In his February 2020 defence speech, he described a European dimension to France’s vital interests and invited willing partners into a strategic dialogue. He also offered the possibility of involvement in French deterrence exercises.

That was an invitation to understand and cooperate with a French policy. It was not a transfer of the French president’s authority. The distinction remains the central obstacle to turning a sympathetic exchange between leaders into reassurance that survives a crisis.

Macron made the national limit explicit again in his March 2025 address on European security. He opened a debate about protecting allies through French deterrence while retaining the ultimate decision for France’s president. Berlin’s public engagement now brings that offer closer to a practical test.

What, exactly, would Germany be receiving? A declaration that its security matters to Paris would carry political weight. Consultation about threats could improve mutual understanding. Joint exercises could demonstrate a willingness to plan together. None of those steps, on its own, would specify how France would respond to an attack on a neighbour.

Nor would a more elaborate declaration necessarily settle the issue. Nuclear deterrence depends partly on an adversary’s uncertainty. A government may prefer to leave its possible response open rather than write an exhaustive list of circumstances in which it would act. An ally, however, wants uncertainty reduced when its own protection is at stake.

That creates a negotiation with two audiences. Words aimed at Moscow must preserve the risk of escalation. Words aimed at Berlin must offer enough assurance to justify political and potentially financial commitments. Language that works for one audience can frustrate the other.

The difficulty is political before it is technical. Germany would have to explain why a French decision offers useful additional protection even though Germany cannot control it. France would have to explain why deeper consultation strengthens its deterrent rather than giving foreign governments an informal claim over a national responsibility.

A bilateral arrangement could begin modestly. Officials could compare threat assessments, discuss crisis communication and identify conventional forces that might support a deterrence mission. Such work would give substance to the discussion without pretending that the two states had created a single nuclear policy. Whether Paris and Berlin choose that route remains open.

Munich’s other message: keep Washington inside

Mark Rutte supplied a different emphasis at the same conference. NATO’s secretary general defended a stronger European role with the United States still firmly part of the alliance. NATO’s account of his Munich meetings described discussions with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and other partners alongside that argument.

This was not a simple clash between a pro-American NATO chief and a post-American German chancellor. Merz also argued for repairing the transatlantic partnership. The disagreement was more about where to place political weight: on the alliance’s continuing strength, or on the additional options Europe needs because that strength can no longer be treated as an unquestioned assumption.

Rutte’s public panel on 14 February made Ukraine the immediate test. Questioned by moderator Christiane Amanpour about what help Ukrainians could expect, he described damage to civilian heating infrastructure that he had seen during a visit to Kyiv. His account was an argument for continued assistance, not evidence that a settlement had been secured.

The conference therefore contained two security timescales. A discussion of nuclear reassurance concerns an extreme contingency and arrangements that could take years to develop. Ukraine’s need for air defence concerns equipment and interceptors that have to arrive while attacks continue. One cannot substitute for the other.

That point had already emerged at the NATO defence ministers’ meeting in Brussels on 12 February. Rutte described the PURL mechanism for financing critical American equipment for Ukraine, NSATU’s work coordinating training and deliveries, and support for Ukrainian innovation. Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov attended his first NATO–Ukraine Council meeting in that role.

For European governments, those mechanisms expose the limits of a purely rhetorical break with Washington. They can increase the money they provide while still needing American-made equipment. They can seek greater industrial independence while purchasing urgently from existing production lines. Dependence is not eliminated simply because a cabinet has decided it is undesirable.

Yet the opposite inference would also go too far. Continued reliance on US equipment does not require Europeans to postpone every discussion about alternatives. Planning becomes more valuable when replacement would take a long time. The important question is whether nuclear consultation is accompanied by improvements in conventional defence, rather than used to obscure their cost.

A credible European contribution would give Washington reasons to remain engaged and Moscow reasons to doubt it could exploit an American distraction. That is the strongest argument for treating the French discussion as additional insurance. The weakest version would advertise a new guarantee before any government had agreed what it contained.

Germany cannot negotiate for everyone

There is a geographical problem with a Franco-German starting point. The states most exposed to a confrontation with Russia are not interchangeable with Germany. A reassurance negotiated mainly around Berlin’s concerns could leave governments farther east wondering how their interests would enter the calculation.

Merz addressed that danger by rejecting differing levels of security within Europe. But a commitment to avoid unequal protection still requires a method. Would other governments join consultations? Would they be briefed after decisions? Could they participate in exercises? Would membership of the EU or NATO determine eligibility?

These are substantive choices. An arrangement confined to EU members would sit awkwardly alongside Britain, which remains a nuclear power and an important European military actor. A format encompassing every NATO ally would raise different questions about how an explicitly European initiative relates to Washington.

The distinction between consultation and a veto would be especially sensitive. A smaller state might reasonably seek a voice in discussions about threats to its territory. France would be unlikely to regard consultation as permission for partners to determine the use of its nuclear forces. Neither preference is inherently contradictory; the negotiation becomes difficult when public language conceals the difference.

Financial participation could intensify that tension. If a partner contributed resources to facilities, exercises or supporting conventional capabilities, its parliament would ask what influence accompanied the expenditure. A French government might regard the contribution as a practical act of solidarity rather than the purchase of a seat at the decision-making table.

There is also a problem of duration. Merz and Macron can begin a dialogue, but a reassurance that depends on their personal relationship would be fragile. Officials would need a way to preserve communication across elections, changes of government and disagreements over other European policies.

No arrangement can entirely remove electoral uncertainty. The American debate itself is a reminder of that. But regular consultation, parliamentary explanation and clearly assigned responsibilities could make cooperation harder to abandon casually. These would be less dramatic developments than a new doctrine announced from a podium, and potentially more useful.

The task is not to reproduce the American relationship with a French flag. France’s resources, strategic traditions and political institutions differ. The meaningful test is narrower: whether cooperation with Paris can reduce a particular vulnerability that European governments have identified, without creating promises that neither side can sustain.

An exercise is a signal, not an automatic guarantee

One possible route runs through the exercise offer Macron made in 2020. Participation could help partner governments understand how France thinks about escalation and allow France to understand the circumstances in which its neighbours might feel exposed.

The value would depend on what participation means. Observing an exercise is different from helping plan it. Providing conventional support is different from taking part in a nuclear decision. Public announcements that blur those distinctions might reassure an audience briefly while creating later misunderstandings between governments.

For a deterrent, misunderstandings can work in opposite directions. An adversary that underestimates the likelihood of allied action might take a dangerous risk. A government that overestimates the protection it has been promised could make assumptions its partner has never accepted. Better consultation is useful precisely because it can expose those gaps before an emergency.

French officials would also have to consider what to make public. Too little information could leave partners’ voters unsure why the initiative mattered. Too much detail could turn a politically sensitive conversation into a checklist of exclusions, inviting arguments about which country or scenario had been omitted.

The Munich discussion already attracted attention beyond governments. In comments reproduced by IFRI from POLITICO’s coverage, deterrence researcher Héloïse Fayet argued that the political setting now offered a chance to align European approaches and called for concrete follow-through. Her observation captured the change in opportunity; it did not demonstrate that an operational agreement existed.

The immediate evidence remains the chancellor’s disclosure of preliminary talks and the French positions previously set out in public. Claims that Europe has acquired a new nuclear umbrella would outrun that record. So would a claim that German engagement is meaningless until France changes its ultimate decision-making authority.

Between those extremes lies a substantial field of possible cooperation. Governments can improve warning, communication, shared understanding and conventional support while leaving national command intact. Whether that would be enough to reassure the most exposed allies is a question for those allies, not one Paris and Berlin can answer on their behalf.

The decision after the speech

For Merz, the immediate advantage of speaking publicly is that the discussion becomes harder to dismiss as a French project searching for a German audience. Germany has now acknowledged that it has a stake in the answer. The cost is that Berlin will be pressed to describe the commitment behind its interest.

For Macron, the opportunity is to give a European dimension to French deterrence without surrendering the presidency’s central authority. But an offer that remains entirely on French terms could fail to secure the confidence of partners. Paris will need to show that listening is part of consultation, even where control remains national.

Rutte’s challenge is different. NATO has to accommodate a more assertive European debate while maintaining confidence in the collective framework. If European initiatives are presented as evidence that the alliance is already unworkable, they could weaken the institution still responsible for the continent’s immediate defence. If every discussion is discouraged for fear of that implication, governments could remain exposed to risks they already recognise.

The next useful developments would be identifiable. Paris and Berlin could establish a regular consultation format, clarify the involvement of other allies or set out an exercise programme. Conversely, contradictory descriptions from the two capitals would suggest that they had agreed to talk before agreeing on the purpose of the conversation.

There is no reason to assume that one announcement must resolve all of those questions. Preliminary talks are allowed to be preliminary. The danger lies in allowing the announcement to acquire the political weight of a finished guarantee while the underlying work remains at an exploratory stage.

Munich brought the French offer and the German need for options into the same public argument. It also left America at the centre of Europe’s immediate security arrangements. The difficult work now is to make those two facts coexist in a policy that allies can understand—and an adversary cannot casually discount.