| __modern__ reactors are build to be rarely opened and burn off as much plutonium as possible. But that's obviously not how the french nuclear program started. Only doing nuclear research for military purposes is frowned upon by your neighbours and makes you look suspicous, and only having a civilian program is super complex and expensive and doesn't even make you untouchable.
Luckily building the infrastructure for a nuclear arsenal goes hand in hand with building the infrastructure for civilian uses, so you have a buy one, get one free situation. >> The National Assembly approved the initial nuclear energy plan for a five-year term on July 24, 1952. The plan sought to build two experimental reactors at the Marcoule nuclear site, and construction began in 1955. Shortly thereafter, the construction of a third reactor commenced. In addition to generating electricity, these reactors would produce plutonium in sufficient quantities to support a civil advanced reactor program and potentially a military one, at a cost three times lower than highly enriched uranium.[69][70][71] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_France%27s_civil_nu... >> In 1957 Euratom was created, and under cover of the peaceful use of nuclear power the French signed deals with West Germany and Italy to work together on nuclear weapons development.[18] The Chancellor of West Germany Konrad Adenauer told his cabinet that he "wanted to achieve, through EURATOM, as quickly as possible, the chance of producing our own nuclear weapons". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France_and_weapons_of_mass_des... |
Civilian nuclear power is not needed to have a weapons programs, it can help tho.