As many observers have noticed in the past eight years, France was fairly comfortable with the Bush administration's stance on nuclear issues in international forums and found itself in agreement with many of the hard-line positions taken by the United States in nonproliferation and disarmament negotiations. However, since the Obama administration overtly and explicitly embraced the goal of a "nuclear-weapon-free world," the picture seems to have changed. With London and Washington leading the way, and Beijing and Moscow not being shy of speaking about nuclear abolition (notwithstanding their policies often to the contrary), is France the odd country out in the debate? Yes and no.

What is true is that France is currently the only one of the five nuclear-weapon states that does...