There were good reasons for this. After all, NATO’s mission is the collective security of the Euro-Atlantic region and most of the Bloc member countries are also part of the alliance. Consequently, many considered that the EU was a large security supplier as unnecessary duplication, if not a possible cause of dangerous confusion in the command line in the event of an attack.
However, it is also true that the EU Treaty provides for the creation of a joint defense (also not defined) and for mutual assistance among member countries in the event of assault. In addition, for Europe, NATO, to a large extent, meant political and industrial dependence on Washington.
Anyway, it is clear that current circumstances – including what happened and during the Munich security conference – forces Europe to “grow” with regard to its own Security and Defense. But what should the EU do to build its own defense union?
The United States had already moved its European objective and towards Indo-Pacific under former American president Barack Obama. The establishment of Washington, a democrat and republican, is united when seeing China, not Russia, as its direct strategic rival – even after the assault of Russian president Vladimir Putin towards Ukraine. We can argue that even the support of the predecessor Joe Biden for the country could have been stronger, faster and more coherent.
Now add to a president who may be willing to force a bad ceasefire, which would have terrible consequences for the security of Europe, and which is also a skeptic of NATO, going as far as Threatening abandoned allies who “do not pay” – without forgetting that his expansionist aims to other NATO members such as Canada and Denmark.
On the part of Europe, there is, of course, the temptation to focus solely on things such as the production of joint weapons or on the exemption from the defense expenses of the stability and growth pact – like this was the case with the last Informal Euco. It makes sense. Admittedly, the EU must obtain its capacities and its base of the defense-industrial, and as defense expenses reach unprecedented levels, we must spend better, together and European.
Politices
