Tom VandenkendelaereMember of the European Parliament, and Chair of the Delegation for relations with the NATO Parliamentary Assembly
Our history of European integration in the field of security and defense is marked by slow but steady progress with crises serving as impulses to move forward with smaller and bigger steps.
In recent years, Europe has realized that we are far too dependent on others and far too unable to stand on our own feet. Russia’s annexation of Crimea back in 2014 served as a strong wake-up call. As did Trump’s ‘America first’ policy and the overnight retreat from Kabul.
Decision-making processes were initiated in the EU and NATO to demonstrate a growing awareness of threatening geopolitical developments. These security challenges have led to new commitments and strategies. The still young EU Strategic Compass and the updated NATO Strategic Concept created necessary momentum to substantially strengthen political support for more and better European security and defense policy.
Unfortunately, however, it took a full-scale invasion in Ukraine in 2022 to really change the rules of the game. It made threats in Europe much stronger and the impact on our society much more tangible. The ensuing energy crisis putting the supply and affordability of energy at peril, and energy infrastructure at risk after the attacks on Nordstream, but also the global impact on food security for example were felt by citizens and business alike.
Under this persistent external pressure, the political will for much stronger integration in the field of security and defense policy has never been so effective, as evidenced by debates and decisions at the level of European leaders. At the same time, the challenges are enormous and constantly increasing in a way that urges us to drastically strengthen our security and defense policy by making European decision-making more flexible in this field, in the first place on the basis of a contemporary, more dynamic and result-oriented understanding of national sovereignty in defense matters - if major challenges are common, then the way to tackle them must be common too. We just need to look at the alarming rise of hybrid warfare, new technological developments in the military field, years of neglect of our own defense industry, budgetary problems in the field of defense, fragmentation of defense capabilities with disturbing and even irresponsible overlaps and gaps between Member States.
Political will is a crucial factor, but maintaining unity even more so. Also, this has been an ongoing challenge. Add to this the acceleration of political decision-making, so that policy becomes much more operational on the ground. The EU Strategic Compass distinguishes itself by formulating ambitious but achievable objectives with concrete initiatives, measures and timelines. Above all, it has the full support of all EU heads of state and government. This is a basic strategy that we must continue to support actively. It is now all about timely and decisive implementation as much as continuous updating and further elaboration, as with the recently presented European Defense Industry Strategy.
One of the pillars of the strategy is strengthening our partnerships, primarily with NATO. We need more, wider and deeper EU-NATO cooperation which has already shown reciprocal added value - think of the EU-NATO task force on the resilience of critical infrastructure, which 14 recommendations are now being implemented. But we also need to strengthen our own EU defense that is complementary to NATO’s ambitions. My conviction is clear: the policy choice is not ‘either EU or NATO’, but a strong EU for a strong NATO and vice versa. The expansion of NATO with Finland and Sweden is historical and a good thing for Europe. Let us hope this also is a trigger to definitively change discussions in European member states about the future of NATO and our budgetary contributions to it.
Of course we also need to take a look at transatlantic security relations. In the US, Ukraine fatigue is growing in public opinion. This trend is also becoming visible in Europe, but less so for the time being. With the recently concluded €50 billion support package for Ukraine, Europe is showing that it is not giving up on Ukraine in the years to come. But the American conviction that Europe has benefited too much from them for too long and still takes insufficient responsibility towards Ukraine and other security challenges in general, is - alas but understandably - a deep-rooted one that is shared across the congress aisle. A possible Trump comeback risks severely jeopardising trust between the US and its European partners, precisely on the basis of that deep-rooted conviction.
In the light of Russia’s war of aggression, it is evident that we must substantially upgrade our common security and defense policy. It is not yet clear how this architecture will look like in the end, but in all scenarios two principles will turn out to be nothing less than imperative: (1) the EU has to urgently and adequately continue to invest in reducing its dependencies from third countries in all strategic areas, and in reinforcing its resilience in its multiple relevant aspects, and (2) NATO has to continue to play a key role in meeting the security needs of the EU, with the EU-NATO partnership continuously being updated and upgraded accordingly.