title: European nuclear nationalism: UK and French perspectives on nuclear disarmament
abstract: The UK and France were the first sub-superpowers to develop nuclear 
  forces after participating in the US Manhattan Project. Despite critiques in 
  the two countries, the British and French decision-making elites never felt 
  that a US pledge of extended nuclear deterrence could substitute for what 
  they regarded as independent nuclear forces (Pelopidas 2015b). In both 
  countries, the development of a nuclear arsenal coincided with the loss of 
  a colonial Empire, the brutalizing impact of six year