On Wednesday 17 April, the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said that in view of the “changing security environment”, the EU needed to start working on the future of its security architecture “with all the speed and political will required”.
Within this framework, while fundamental actions will always remain the responsibility of the Member States, “Europe also has tools and responsibilities in areas that are critical to our defence. From the Single Market to research, from innovation to industry and much more”, stressed the President at the European Defence and Security Summit in Brussels. “We need to use Europe’s combined financial, structural and political strength where it can have the biggest impact”, she argued.
According to the President, at European level the focus needs to be on three priorities: preparedness, investment and partnerships.
“Strengthening Europe’s preparedness is an urgent task”, warned Ms von der Leyen, adding that Europeans needed to be better prepared to deal with multidimensional threats that “cross-over and intensify each other”. In her view, the EU can help coordinate the military and civilian spheres and play a role in rearming Europe, “for instance by supporting industry to manufacture the necessary capabilities to respond to all scenarios, including at the highest level of intensity”.
Believing that the threat of war was not “imminent”, but not “impossible” either, the President explained that it was vital to be prepared. In her view, this means increasing the EU’s defence industrial capacity over the next 5 years, based on the “spend more, spend better, spend European” principle.
If the EU is to develop its strategic autonomy, it must also focus on partnerships. “As we strengthen our own sovereignty of defence, industry and key technologies, we will also strengthen our core partnership with NATO”, explained Ms von der Leyen. She also promised that cooperation with Ukraine would continue to be strengthened and that it was necessary to check whether specific cooperation on security and defence with other partners, such as the United Kingdom, was necessary. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)