MPs recalibrate military spending, allocating an additional 36 billion by 2030

On Monday, May 4th, the National Assembly is revisiting a law passed in 2023, but one already overtaken by current strategic events. "The world is becoming harsher all around us," summarized the Minister of the Armed Forces, Catherine Vautrin, as she defended an update to the Military Programming Law for 2030. This would secure an additional €36 billion, bringing the total budget to €436 billion. The stated objective is clear: to act faster, strike harder, and sustain operations longer, in a Europe where the war in Ukraine is taking hold and where the Near and Middle East are brutally reminding us that modern conflicts cannot be predicted.

Accelerate purchases, replenish stocks, without changing the size of the armies

Behind the rhetoric lie very concrete budget lines and one word that keeps recurring like a refrain in the corridors: ammunition. Without altering the structure of the armed forces, the text hammers home the idea of ​​endurance, a capability less spectacular than major programs but crucial when time is of the essence: stockpiles, maintenance, and ramping up industrial production. The government also wants to shorten lead times, simplify procedures, and promote a kind of French-style war economy where the administration allows itself less delay and industry greater volume. The text, supported in committee by the centrist bloc and the Socialists, thus proceeds along a narrow path: modernizing without a complete overhaul, accelerating without promising the impossible.

The political crux of the matter remains, with all its inherent complexities. The creation of a "national security alert state," which would authorize exemptions to certain regulations (construction, expropriation, environment) in the event of a "serious threat," worries a segment of the left wing, which fears a regime of exception with vaguely defined parameters. Another sensitive issue is the expansion of anti-drone capabilities, with the possibility for certain operators, such as airports, to neutralize drones, including through subcontractors, against a backdrop of incursions that have already paralyzed air traffic in Europe. And then there's 2027, a presidential election year, with the idea that a future head of state might want to impose their own legislation, proof that France is accelerating its efforts… all while keeping a watchful eye on the political clock.