{"id":26540,"date":"2019-02-05T21:59:44","date_gmt":"2019-02-05T21:59:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/airforcetimes\/uncategorized\/2019\/02\/05\/french-air-force-rehearses-a-long-range-nuclear-strike\/"},"modified":"2026-08-07T22:00:55","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T22:00:55","slug":"french-air-force-rehearses-a-long-range-nuclear-strike","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/airforcetimes\/flashpoints\/2019\/02\/05\/french-air-force-rehearses-a-long-range-nuclear-strike\/","title":{"rendered":"French Air Force rehearses a long-range nuclear strike"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

COLOGNE, Germany \u2014 The French Air Force has successfully practiced a nuclear strike mission<\/a>, 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Feb. 4 mission, billed by the Armed Forces Ministry as \u201coperation-representative,\u201d featured a Rafale fighter jet releasing an ASMP-A missile, made by MBDA. Officials designed the drill to include \u201call phases characteristic of a nuclear-dissuasion mission,\u201d including successive refueling by C-135 and A-330 tankers before aiming the missile \u2014 without a nuclear warhead \u2014 at a missile test area near the town of Biscarrosse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis success reinforces the technical and operational credibility of the deterrence that the airborne component has continuously maintained through the Air Force since 1964,\u201d reads an Armed Forces Ministry statement from Feb. 5.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Besides its aerial deterrence leg, the French military has submarines capable of firing nuclear-tipped missiles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Monday\u2019s test came days after Russia and the United States said they would abandon a key arms-control agreement<\/a> that has kept Europe free of the threat of intermediate-range nuclear weapons for decades.<\/p>\n\n\n\t