General Claudio Graziano, Chairman of the EU Military Committee, gave a mixed assessment of European defence initiatives on Monday 7 September before the European Parliament’s Subcommittee on Security and Defence.
The General pointed out that the initial findings of the Coordinated Annual Defence Review (CARD) had highlighted the lack of consistency in approaches between Member States, particularly in terms of public procurement.
“According to initial analyses, national and NATO requirements take precedence over European requirements, which is not a good thing for European projects”, he explained.
Similarly, the General considered that permanent structured cooperation (PSC or PESCO) was not being fully exploited. In his view, there is a lack of understanding and trust, and the fact that there is still no agreement on the participation of third countries makes PSC less attractive.
The Chairman of the Military Committee also regretted that the budget for the European Defence Fund had decreased from 13 to 7 billion euros in the Multiannual Financial Framework. According to the Director General of the European Commission’s DG Defence-Industry-Space (DEFIS), Timo Pesonen, the defence industry will lose about 20% of its turnover this year, but the impact will be felt all the more next year.
Returning also to the creation of the strategic compass, General Graziano considered that the commitment of the Member States in its implementation would be decisive for the credibility of the European defence project. “We need to reduce our dependence on external suppliers, which is why we need to move forward”, he added, believing that the next few months would be crucial for European defence.
In addition, Timo Pesonen gave an update on the creation of DG DEFIS, asking Member States to inform the Commission of national experts who could join his service. “We need to increase our experience and personnel, we need national experts to be able to build a real defence policy and above all a defence culture”, he explained. There are currently 220 people working in the DG. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)