Saturday, February 21, 2026

Germany has a new nuclear question to consider

Nuclear energy doesn't mean nukes.
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Germany Is Thinking the Unthinkable on the Nuclear Bomb — Katja Hoyer

It was early 2025 when US Vice President JD Vance made his bombshell speech at the Munich Security Conference about Europe's "threat from within." A year later, and a continent no longer sure of American security guarantees has used the same event to assess its nuclear options.

Only France and Britain have nuclear weapons in Western Europe. So should other countries, especially the largest power in the neighborhood, become involved? Germany is seriously debating whether it needs the bomb. Haunted by Cold War memories and legally restricted, it's unlikely to go there. But it should use this historic opportunity to reset its relationship with nuclear technology in all its guises. The shuttering of its atomic power stations is equally consequential for its security, an act of economic self-harm that stops it controlling its own energy supply and hobbles its once mighty industries.

Militarily, Berlin's nuclear debate has suddenly moved onto territory that would have been unthinkable only recently. Bundeswehr Brigadier General Frank Pieper has argued that his nation "needs its own tactical nuclear weapons," and fast. Historian Harald Biermann says "we must urgently talk about protecting Germany by means of our own or European nuclear weapons." The Greens' Joschka Fischer, an ex-foreign minister, is also arguing for European nukes. This is remarkable for a party that emerged from the 1980s pacifist movement, one whose anti-bomb sentiments inspired huge street protests. "Times have changed," he says. Clearly.

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