Wethen, 21 April 2026
Church & Peace Board Member Martin Tiller writes about the Munich Security Conference’s report on Europe’s “nuclear options” (2026). He criticizes the fact that some other key options have not been considered, particularly from a Christian perspective. The Executive Board of Church and Peace welcomes Martin Tiller’s criticism.
Picture the scene. Your old car has become unreliable, and you are increasingly worried that it will leave you stranded and vulnerable when you need it most. You go along to your local second-hand showroom, but they only have four vehicles for sale. They are all very expensive, unattractive, and they actually look unsafe to you. What will you do? Soldier on with your existing model? Settle for one of the nasty ones on sale? Of course not. You will try another showroom. Or perhaps you’ll reconsider whether you wanted a car at all – maybe a bike or public transport would be better all round.
A recent report by the influential Munich Security Conference (MSC) called Mind the Deterrence Gap: Assessing Europe’s Nuclear Options puts Europeans in that position. It says that Europe can no longer rely on the USA for nuclear deterrence, and should stop ‘outsourcing’ its strategic thinking to the USA. So far so good. The USA has become highly unreliable and could well leave us high and dry in our hour of need. This statement, unthinkable a year or two ago, is now accepted widely among European leaders.
The report offers us five options:
A. Continuing to rely on the USA (basically the current position)
B. Increasing the French and British role in Europe’s nuclear deterrence
C. Developing a ‘Eurodeterrent’
D. European countries developing their own nuclear weapons independently
E. Focusing on conventional (non-nuclear) deterrence.
It does not pretend that any of these options are good ones. By its own admission, Option A leaves Europe at the whim of the USA. Options B, C and E rely on implausible levels of co-operation and consensus across Europe. Options C and D would contravene (and potentially kill off) the 1970 Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT) which is currently seen as the bedrock of international stability. Option E might sound attractive because it reduces the need for nuclear weapons, but is seen as politically challenging, mainly due to the very high cost of building up conventional capabilities. All five are eye-wateringly expensive, and would become more so if, as expected, they led to an arms race. Yet the report insists that Europe has no other choices, and had better start deciding soon.
The entire 74-page report only mentions the United Nations once, in a footnote. What happened to our commitment to all nations working together to overcome their differences and, in the words of Dag Hammarskjöld, if not to bring humanity to heaven, at least to save us from hell? The report’s readiness to consider undermining and ignoring existing treaties shows how desperately short of ideas its authors must feel.
The report takes it as axiomatic that Russia represents an implacable threat to Europe. It refers to Russia’s use of nuclear ‘signalling’ to deter its adversaries from getting directly involved in the Ukraine war, and states that Russia may yet resort to nuclear weapons in that conflict. It also describes a “plausible near-future scenario” where “sensing an opportunity, Moscow makes coercive demands of a NATO Ally and detonates a nuclear device at sea to demonstrate resolve and test the cohesion of the Alliance.” There is no suggestion that Russia could ever respond positively to diplomacy or that this should even be attempted. There is no recognition that other nuclear powers, including within NATO, can also be perceived as aggressive, and have never ruled out nuclear first use. There is no recognition that nuclear deterrence, which relies on all parties acting rationally, looks an increasingly shaky concept. There is no recognition that we need to build trust internationally, not undermine it, to help humanity face up to climate change and other global risks. And there is no recognition that the imago dei extends to Russians – they are simply othered, a threat to be contained (militarily).
As Christians we believe that reasoning like this falls far short of the “life in all its fullness” Jesus promised (John 10:10). Romans chapter 6 speaks of humanity’s natural enslavement to sin, and its inevitable outcome of death. But through Jesus’ death and resurrection we enjoy freedom and life; we must never act as though we had no good choice. God offers us freedom, not a choice between forms of enslavement.
So next time a pushy salesman offers you a choice of four overpriced old bangers, don’t be intimidated. Look elsewhere.
