The European Defence Agency (EDA) presented its analysis of the EU’s defence investment shortfalls on Tuesday 17 May.
“Every year between 2009 and 2018, if we had spent the same amount as we did in 2009, we would have spent 160 billion more”, explained the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell, after the Defence Council. This period was, he said, “a significant and silent process of disarmament”.
In 2009, according to the World Bank, Member States’ defence spending was around €225 billion.
The EDA’s analysis, the findings of which will be incorporated into the analysis that the European Commission is expected to adopt on Wednesday, covers three partially overlapping time horizons.
Thus, according to the Agency, an immediate measure should be to work on the combat readiness of forces and capabilities. Mr Borrell explained that the Europeans had to replenish their stock of military equipment, some of which had been sent to Ukraine.
From 2022-2023, “with an impact in the next 5 years”, the focus should be on increasing the mass and volume of existing capacity, according to the EDA, and in the medium to long term, ten years and beyond, the focus should be on structural strengthening and upgrading capacity.
“Europe must spend together, more and better, and as there seems to be a certain willingness to spend more, this is the opportunity to do it together, because this is the best way to do it”, Borrell reiterated, saying that if Europe did not spend together, they would only multiply their shortcomings. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)