Overview
- Speaking at the Berlin Security Conference, René Obermann called for Germany, France, the U.K. and other willing states to develop a common, staged deterrence that includes tactical nuclear weapons.
- He pointed to what he described as more than 500 Russian tactical warheads along NATO’s eastern flank and in Belarus and asked how Europe would respond to a limited nuclear strike.
- France and the U.K. hold independent arsenals of roughly 290 and 225 warheads respectively, yet neither fields tactical weapons and there is no shared European doctrine for limited nuclear use.
- Germany participates in NATO’s nuclear-sharing mission but owns no nuclear weapons, while Russia’s total arsenal is estimated at about 5,580 warheads.
- The remarks heightened a sensitive debate driven by Russia’s war in Ukraine, doubts about U.S. reliability, and warnings such as Boris Pistorius’s estimate of possible NATO risk by 2028, with no government adopting the proposal.