The French navy is shifting its training away from a focus on policing operations to gird for war against foes who want “to destroy us,” says Rear Admiral Jacques Mallard, the commander of France’s carrier battle group.
“Naval combat is becoming increasingly likely,” he told POLITICO. “We’re moving from a world where we were pretty free to do as we pleased to one where we feel threatened on a more regular basis … We now train for other missions, in particular what we call high-intensity warfare.”
France is the only EU country operating a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier — the Charles de Gaulle, which also carries nuclear weapons. It is the flagship of a wider carrier battle group that includes nuclear submarines, frigates and Rafale fighter jets.
France’s carrier battle group is expected to start a mission in the Mediterranean Sea in the coming days.
With Russia’s war against Ukraine also spilling into the Black Sea and Iran-backed Houthi rebels relentlessly attacking warships and commercial vessels in the Red Sea, Western navies have to adapt to a new environment with “increasingly uninhibited competitors,” Mallard said.
“That’s where we become a little more aggressive, or at least, we prepare to be,” the rear admiral continued.
Sailors practice fighting against “someone who wants to destroy us. Not someone who wants to do illegal trafficking, not someone who wants to steal fish, not someone who wants to watch or observe us: someone who wants to destroy us,” he said.
