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Biological warfare Chemical warfare Nuclear weapons Radiological weapons Image File history File links Please see the file description page for further information. ... The Redoutable, the first French nuclear missile submarine // a Pluton missile mobile launcher The Force de frappe (literally Striking Force; meant for dissuasion, i. ... For the album, see Weapons of Mass Destruction (album). ... Image File history File links WMD_world_map. ... For the use of biological agents by terrorists, see bioterrorism. ... Chemical warfare is warfare (and associated military operations) using the toxic properties of chemical substances to kill, injure or incapacitate an enemy. ... The mushroom cloud of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki, Japan, 1945, rose some 18 kilometers (11 mi) above the hypocenter. ... A radiological weapon (or radiological dispersion device, RDD) is any weapon that is designed to spread radioactive material with the intent to kill, and cause disruption upon a city or nation. ...
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Nuclear weapons
History of nuclear weapons Nuclear warfare Nuclear arms race Weapon design / testing Effects of nuclear explosions Delivery systems Nuclear espionage Proliferation / Arsenals The Peoples Republic of China is estimated by the U.S. Government to have an arsenal of about 150 nuclear weapons as of 1999. ... The Republic of China on Taiwan denies having chemical or nuclear weapons. ... The mushroom cloud of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki, Japan, 1945, rose some 18 kilometers (11 mi) above the hypocenter. ... Image File history File links A picture of a mockup of the Fat Man nuclear device, from http://www. ... A nuclear fireball lights up the night in a United States nuclear test. ... For the 1989 computer game, see Nuclear War (computer game). ... U.S. and USSR/Russian nuclear weapons stockpiles, 1945-2006. ... The first nuclear weapons, though large, cumbersome and inefficient, provided the basic design building blocks of all future weapons. ... Preparation for an underground nuclear test at the Nevada Test Site in the 1980s. ... A 23 kiloton tower shot called BADGER, fired on April 18, 1953 at the Nevada Test Site, as part of the Operation Upshot-Knothole nuclear test series. ... // Nuclear weapons delivery is the technology and systems used to place a nuclear weapon at the position of detonation, on or near its intended target. ... Nuclear espionage is the purposeful giving of state secrets regarding nuclear weapons to other states without authorization (espionage). ... World map with nuclear weapons development status represented by color. ... This is a list of nuclear weapons ordered by state and then type within the states. ...
Nuclear-armed states
US · Russia · UK · France China · India · Pakistan Israel · North Korea South Africa This is a list of states with nuclear weapons, sometimes called the nuclear club. ... The United States was the first country in the world to successfully develop nuclear weapons, and is the only country to have used them in war against another nation. ...
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France is said to have an arsenal of approximately 350 nuclear weapons stockpiled as of 2002.^[1] The weapons are part of the national Force de frappe, developed in the late 1950s and 1960s to give France the ability to distance itself from NATO while having a means of nuclear deterrence under sovereign control. The mushroom cloud of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki, Japan, 1945, rose some 18 kilometers (11 mi) above the hypocenter. ... The Redoutable, the first French nuclear missile submarine // a Pluton missile mobile launcher The Force de frappe (literally Striking Force; meant for dissuasion, i. ... NATO 2002 Summit in Prague. ... Mutual assured destruction (MAD) is the doctrine of military strategy in which a full scale use of nuclear weapons by one of two opposing sides would result in the destruction of both the attacker and the defender. ...

France is one of the five "Nuclear Weapons States" (NWS) under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which France ratified in 1992. France has never ratified the Partial Test Ban Treaty, leaving it open to conduct nuclear tests. However, it has signed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Opened for signature July 1, 1968 in New York Entered into force March 5, 1970 Conditions for entry into force Ratification by the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, the United States, and 40 other signatory states. ... The Treaty Banning poop, in Outer Space, and Under Water, often abbreviated as the Partial Test Ban Treaty (PTBT), Limited Test Ban Treaty (LTBT), or Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (NTBT), although the former also refers to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), is a treaty intended to obtain an agreement... Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty Opened for signature September 10, 1996[1] in New York Entered into force Not yet in force Conditions for entry into force The treaty will enter into force 180 days after it is ratified by all of the following 44 (Annex 2) countries: Algeria, Argentina...

France is not known to possess or develop any chemical or biological weapons. Early detection of chemical agents Sociopolitical climate of chemical warfare While the study of chemicals and their military uses was widespread in China, the use of toxic materials has historically been viewed with mixed emotions and some disdain in the West (especially when the enemy were doing it). ... Biological Weapons: Friend or Foe? By Dom Harris There is great debate about whether biological weapons are good or bad, and whether the world should be concerned about their development. ...

History

Main article: Nuclear weapons and France

There were 210 French nuclear tests from 1960 until 1996. ...

Initial interest

France was one of the nuclear pioneers going back to the work of Marie Curie (a Polish scientist living in France), and Curie's last assistant Bertrand Goldschmidt became the father of the French Bomb. During the Second World War Goldschmidt invented the standard method for extracting plutonium while working as part of the British/Canadian team participating in the Manhattan Project. But after the Liberation in 1945 France had to start again almost from scratch. Nevertheless the first French reactor went critical in 1948 and small amounts of plutonium were extracted in 1949. There was no formal commitment to a nuclear weapons program although plans were made to build reactors for the large scale production of plutonium.^[2] Madame Curie redirects here. ... General Name, Symbol, Number plutonium, Pu, 94 Chemical series actinides Group, Period, Block n/a, 7, f Appearance silvery white Standard atomic weight (244) g·mol−1 Electron configuration [Rn] 5f6 7s2 Electrons per shell 2, 8, 18, 32, 24, 8, 2 Physical properties Phase solid Density (near r. ... The Manhattan Project resulted in the creation of the first nuclear weapons, and the first-ever nuclear detonation, known as the Trinity test of July 16, 1945. ...

France was eager to cooperate with other countries on nuclear weapons. In May 1954 the French were losing the war in Indochina against Ho Chi Minh. At the height of the decisive battle at Dien Bien Phu France's nuclear bosses sent a request to the chairman of the British Atomic Energy Authority. It was a shopping list of items that would help them build nuclear weapons including a sample quantity of plutonium "so we can take the steps preparatory to the utilisation of our own plutonium".^[3] Before the letter even arrived the French had lost the battle and the war but later that year the French prime minister, Pierre Mendès-France, made the formal decision to build the atom bomb. Britain agreed to supply the requested nuclear materials, including enriched uranium. Among the most important parts of the agreement was an arrangement for the British to check the blueprints and construction of French plutonium production reactors. Hồ Chí Minh   (May 19, 1890 – September 2, 1969) was a Vietnamese revolutionary and statesman, who later became Prime Minister (1946–1955) and President (1946–1969) of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. ... Combatants French Union France State of Vietnam Hmong mercenaries Viet Minh Commanders Christian de Castries # Pierre Langlais # René Cogny Vo Nguyen Giap Strength As of March 13: 10,800[1] As of March 13: 48,000 combat personnel, 15,000 logistical support personnel[2] Casualties 2,293 dead, 5,195... The United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) was established in 1954 as a statutory corporation to oversee and pioneer the development of nuclear energy within the United Kingdom. ... Pierre Mendès France Pierre Mendès France (Paris, 11 January 1907 - 18 October 1982), French politician, was born in Paris, into a family of Portuguese Sephardic Jewish origin. ...

According to one source, this not only helped the French get their military plutonium reactor at Marcoule into operation quickly but it also averted a disaster, for the British found defects which could have caused a catastrophic explosion at the Rhone Valley site.^[3] The same source says that when Charles de Gaulle came to power in 1958 he personally thanked Harold Macmillan for the team's work. Marcoule is located in the Chusclan and Codolet French communes, near Bagnols-sur-Cèze in the Gard department, which is in the touristic, wine and agricultural Côtes-du-Rhône region. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... Maurice Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, OM, PC (10 February 1894 – 29 December 1986), was a British Conservative politician and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1957 to 1963. ...

There remained France's request for plutonium. In 1955 Britain agreed to export ten grams but "...we would not tell the US that we were going to give the French plutonium nor about any similar cases...".^[3] France was eager to cooperate with other countries on nuclear weapons.

In 1956 the French agreed to secretly build the Dimona nuclear reactor in Israel and soon after agreed to construct a reprocessing plant for the extraction of plutonium at the site. The intervention of the United States in the Suez Crisis in the same year is also credited with convincing France that it needed to accelerate its own nuclear weapons program to remain a global power.^[4] Combatants Israel United Kingdom France Egypt Commanders Moshe Dayan Charles Keightley Pierre Barjot Gamal Abdel Nasser Abdel Hakim Amer Strength 175,000 Israeli 45,000 British 34,000 French 70,000 Casualties 197 Israeli KIA 56 British KIA 91 British WIA 10 French KIA 43 French WIA 650 KIA 2... The top global powers usually have relatively high military budgets, reflecting their powerful military capabilities. ...

The following year Euratom was created and under cover of the peaceful use of nuclear power the French signed deals with Germany and Italy to work together on nuclear weapons development.^[5] The West German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer told his cabinet that he "wanted to achieve, through EURATOM, as quickly as possible, the chance of producing our own nuclear weapons".^[6] The idea was short-lived. In 1958 De Gaulle became President and Germany and Italy were excluded. The European Atomic Energy Community, or EURATOM, is an international organization composed of the members of the European Union. ... For other uses, see Konrad Adenauer (disambiguation). ...

First nuclear tests

For more details on this topic, see Gerboise Bleue.

De Gaulle accelerated the French weapons programme and on 13 February 1960 after many twists and turns they detonated their first atom bomb in the French Algeria desert Sahara. The bomb had a 70 kiloton yield. Although Algeria became independent in 1962 France continued nuclear tests there until 1966 although the later tests were underground rather than atmospheric. Gerboise Bleue (blue jerboa) was the name of the first French nuclear test. ... is the 44th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1960 (MCMLX) was a leap year starting on Friday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... French rule in Algeria, 1830–1962 Most of Frances actions in Algeria, not least the invasion of Algiers, were propelled by contradictory impulses. ...

For more details on this topic, see Opération Canopus.

The French began development of the hydrogen bomb and built a new test range on the French Polynesian islands of Mururoa and Fangataufa. On 24 August 1968 France succeeded in detonating a thermonuclear weapon - codenamed Canopus - over Fangataufa. A fission device ignited a lithium 6 deuteride secondary inside a jacket of highly enriched uranium to create a 2.6 megaton blast which left the whole atoll uninhabitable because of radioactive contamination. Mushroom Cloud from the Canopus explosion rises above Fangataufa Canopus was the code name for Frances first two-stage thermonuclear test, conducted on August 24, 1968 at Fangataufa atoll. ... Moruroa (Mururura, Mururoa) (21°50S., 138°55W.) is an atoll in which forms part of the Tuamoto archipelago in French Polynesia in the southern Pacific Ocean. ... Fangataufa (Fangatafoa) (22°15S., 138°45W.) is a small, low, narrow, barrier reef. ... is the 236th day of the year (237th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1968 (MCMLXVIII) was a leap year starting on Monday (link will display full calendar) of the 1968 Gregorian calendar. ... A megaton or megatonne is a unit of mass equal to 1,000,000 metric tons, i. ...

Anti-test protests

Further information: Nuclear-free zone#New Zealand

• By 1968 only France and China were exploding nuclear weapons atmospherically, and the contamination caused by the H Bomb blasts led to a global protest movement against further French testing.^[7]

• From the early 1960s, New Zealand peace groups CND and Peace Media had been organising nationwide anti nuclear campaigns in protest of testing in French Polynesia. These included two large national petitions presented to the New Zealand government, leading to a joint New Zealand and Australian government action to take France to the International Court of Justice (1972).^[8]

• In 1972, the newly founded Greenpeace with financial and tactical support from other New Zealand peace groups managed to delay nuclear tests at Mururoa by several weeks by trespassing with their yacht the Vega in the testing zone.The crew was entertained by the Admiral of the French Navy in charge of the atoll when Vega was towed into the atoll. The following year, in a return voyage into the forbidden zone, the skipper, David McTaggart, was beaten and severely injured by members of the French military. ^[9]

• In 1973, Peace Media and New Zealand CND organised an international flotilla of protest yachts to sail into the test exclusion zone at Mururoa. ^{[10] [11]}

• In 1973, New Zealand Prime Minister Norman Kirk, as a symbolic act of protest sent a government representative and two navy frigates, HMNZS Canterbury and the HMNZS Otago, to Mururoa.^[12]

• In 1985, under the orders of the then French President Francois Mitterand, ^[13] the Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior was bombed and sunk by the French DGSE secret service in Auckland, New Zealand, as it prepared for another protest of nuclear testing in French military zones. One crew member, the photographer Fernando Pereira, drowned while attempting to recover his equipment. Two members of DGSE were captured and sentenced, but eventually repatriated to France in a controversial affair.

• French president Jacques Chirac's decision to run a nuclear test series at Mururoa in 1995, just one year before the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty was to be signed, caused worldwide protest, including an embargo of French wine. The tests were intended to provide France with enough data to improve nuclear weapons without needing future test.^[14]

• The French Military conducted more than 200 nuclear tests at Mururoa and Fangataufa atolls over a thirty year period ending 1996, 40 of them atmospheric. In August 2006 people of French Polynesia welcomed an official report by the French government confirming the link between an increase in the cases of thyroid cancer and France's atmospheric nuclear tests in the territory since 1966. ^{[15] [16]}

A nuclear-free zone is an area where nuclear weapons and/or nuclear power are banned. ... Preparation for an underground nuclear test at the Nevada Test Site in the 1980s. ... CND logo In British politics, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament has been at the forefront of the peace movement in the United Kingdom and claims to be Europes largest single-issue peace campaign. ... A petition is a request to an authority, most commonly a government official or public entity. ... The International Court of Justice (known colloquially as the World Court or ICJ; French: ) is the primary judicial organ of the United Nations. ... Greenpeace protest against Esso / Exxon Mobil. ... Moruroa (Mururura, Mururoa) (21°50S., 138°55W.) is an atoll in which forms part of the Tuamoto archipelago in French Polynesia in the southern Pacific Ocean. ... David McTaggart being interviewed on CNN David Fraser McTaggart (June 24, 1932 - March 23, 2001) was an Canadian-born environmentalist who played a central part in the foundation of Greenpeace International. ... CND logo In British politics, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament has been at the forefront of the peace movement in the United Kingdom and claims to be Europes largest single-issue peace campaign. ... Moruroa (Mururura, Mururoa) (21°50S., 138°55W.) is an atoll in which forms part of the Tuamoto archipelago in French Polynesia in the southern Pacific Ocean. ... The Prime Minister of New Zealand is most senior officer in the Government of New Zealand. ... Norman Eric Kirk served as Prime Minister of New Zealand from 1972 until his sudden death in 1974 and led the New Zealand Labour Party from 1965 to 1972. ... François Maurice Adrien Marie Mitterrand (October 26, 1916 - January 8, 1996) was a French politician and President of France from May 1981, re-elected in 1988, until 1995. ... Rainbow Warrior is the name of a series of ships operated by Greenpeace. ... The sinking of the Rainbow Warrior, codenamed Operation Satanic [1], was a special operation by the action branch of the French foreign intelligence services, the Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure (DGSE), carried out on July 10, 1985. ... Logo of Francess Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure (DGSE) / General Directorate for External Security. ... Schematic map of Auckland. ... A nuclear test explosion is an experiment involving the detonation of a nuclear weapon. ... Fernando Pereira (1950–July 10, 1985) was a freelance Dutch photographer, of Portuguese origin, who drowned when French intelligence (DGSE) used two underwater mines to sink the ship Rainbow Warrior, owned by the environmental organisation Greenpeace on July 10, 1985 (see sinking of the Rainbow Warrior). ... Jacques René Chirac (born 29 November 1932) is a French politician and a former President of France. ... Moruroa (Mururura, Mururoa) (21°50S., 138°55W.) is an atoll in which forms part of the Tuamoto archipelago in French Polynesia in the southern Pacific Ocean. ... Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty Opened for signature September 10, 1996[1] in New York Entered into force Not yet in force Conditions for entry into force The treaty will enter into force 180 days after it is ratified by all of the following 44 (Annex 2) countries: Algeria, Argentina... For delayed access after publication, see Embargo (academic publishing). ... The Military of France has a long history of serving its country. ... Preparation for an underground nuclear test at the Nevada Test Site in the 1980s. ... Fangataufa (Fangatafoa) (22°15S., 138°45W.) is a small, low, narrow, barrier reef. ... Symbol of the French government The government of France is a semi-presidential system based on the French Constitution of the fifth Republic, in which the nation declares itself to be an indivisible, secular, democratic, and social Republic. The constitution provides for a separation of powers and proclaims Frances... Thyroid cancer is malignant growth of the thyroid gland. ...

Possibility of use

In 2006, French president Jacques Chirac, noted that France would be willing to use nuclear weapons against a state attacking France via terrorist means. He noted that the French nuclear forces had been configured for this option.^[17] Jacques René Chirac (born 29 November 1932) is a French politician and a former President of France. ...

Non-nuclear WMD

France denies currently having chemical weapons, ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) in 1995, and acceded to the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BWC) in 1984. France had also ratified the Geneva Protocol in 1926. Dressing the wounded during a gas attack by Austin O. Spare, 1918. ... Chemical Weapons Convention Opened for signature January 13, 1993 in Paris Entered into force April 29, 1997 Conditions for entry into force Ratification by 50 states and the convening of a Preparatory Commission Parties 181 (as of Oct. ... The Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and on their Destruction (usually referred to as just Biological Weapons Convention, abbreviation: BWC) was the first multilateral disarmament treaty banning the production of an entire category of weapons (with exceptions for medical... The Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use in War of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or other Gases, and of Bacteriological Methods of Warfare, usually called the Geneva Protocol, is a treaty prohibiting the use of chemical and biological weapons. ...

See also

• Nuclear weapons and France
• Weapons of Mass Destruction
• List of states with nuclear weapons
• French 'Simulation' project (to replace live nuclear testing) (in French, French Wikipedia)
• Nuclear-free zone - New Zealand

• Moruroa

There were 210 French nuclear tests from 1960 until 1996. ... For the album, see Weapons of Mass Destruction (album). ... This is a list of states with nuclear weapons, sometimes called the nuclear club. ... A nuclear-free zone is an area where nuclear weapons and/or nuclear power are banned. ... Moruroa Moruroa Moruroa (Mururura, Mururoa) (21°50′S 138°55′W.) is an atoll which forms part of the Tuamoto archipelago in French Polynesia in the southern Pacific Ocean. ...

References

1. ^ Table of French Nuclear Forces (Natural Resources Defense Council, 2002)
2. ^ Origin of the Force de Frappe (Nuclear Weapon Archive)
3. ^ ^{a b c} Britain's dirty secret (article detailing Britain's assistance to foreign nuclear programs, the New Statesman, 13 March 2006)
4. ^ Stuck in the Canal, Fromkin, David - Editorial in the The New York Times, 28 October 2006
5. ^ Die Erinnerungen, Franz Josef Strauss - Berlin 1989, p. 314
6. ^ Germany, the NPT, and the European Option (WISE/NIRS Nuclear Monitor)
7. ^ Origin of the Force de Frappe (Nuclear Weapon Archive)
8. ^ Various nuclear arms and peace activism papers (from the disarmsecure.org website)
9. ^ Making Waves the Greenpeace New Zealand Story by Michael Szabo ISBN 0 7900 0230 2
10. ^ Making Waves the Greenpeace New Zealand Story by Michael Szabo ISBN 0 7900 0230 2
11. ^ Elsa Caron, (ed.) 1974, Fri Alert (Caveman Press, Dunedin). The Yacht Fri's own story of her protest voyage into the French Bomb Test Zone
12. ^ Welcome to the Mururoa Vets website (from the private mururoavet.com website)
13. ^ [1]
14. ^ Les essais nucleaires - report of the French Senate (in French)
15. ^ http://www.abc.net.au/ra/pacbeat/stories/s1703767.htm
16. ^ http://www.guardian.co.uk/france/story/0,11882,1676238,00.html
17. ^ France 'would use nuclear arms' - BBC news, Thursday 19 January 2006

The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) [1] is a leftist, New York City-based, non-profit, non-partisan environmental advocacy group, with offices in Washington, D.C., San Francisco, and Los Angeles. ... The New Statesman is a left-of-centre political weekly published in London. ... is the 72nd day of the year (73rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... For the Manfred Mann album, see 2006 (album). ... The New York Times is a daily newspaper published in New York City by Arthur Ochs Sulzberger Jr. ... is the 301st day of the year (302nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... For the Manfred Mann album, see 2006 (album). ... Dr h. ... The Senate amphitheater in the Luxembourg Palace The Senate (in French :le Sénat) is the upper house of the Parliament of France. ... The British Broadcasting Corporation, which is usually known as the BBC, is the largest broadcasting corporation in the world in terms of audience numbers, employing 26,000 staff in the United Kingdom alone and with a budget of more than GB£4 billion. ...

External links

• A Change in the French Nuclear Doctrine?, Rault, Charles - ISRIA, 25 January, 2006.
• Country overview: France (from the Nuclear Threat Initiative)
• Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
  • Nuclear Notebook: French nuclear forces, 2005, July/August 2005.
  • Nuclear policy: France stands alone July/August 2004
• Greenpeace movie (on the French bombing of the Rainbow Warrior, a ship about to protest French nuclear tests)
• Nuclear Files.org (current information on nuclear stockpiles in France)