On Tuesday 7 May, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk called for the mobilisation of at least €100 billion for Europe’s defence and security.
“Big and well-spent money on European security will push war away from Europe’s borders for a long time, perhaps permanently”, he explained at the European Economic Congress in Katowice, in the presence of the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen (see EUROPE 13406/11).
Mr Tusk also said that over the “next few months and next five years”, Europe must prepare “for a situation in which no power in the world will dare to raise its hand against Europe”.
He called for joint air defence. “Europe will be safe provided there are safe skies over Europe (...) The financial effort to build a dome over Europe seems obvious and politically relatively non-confrontational for all of us”, explained the Polish Prime Minister.
For her part, Ms von der Leyen, the bet to “spend more, spend better and spend European”, used the example of a “truly European air defence system, equipped with knowledge and capabilities”.
She also came back to her proposal of appointing a Defence Commissioner if she is re-elected President of the European Commission, an idea supported by Poland. “If I am the next President of the European Commission, I will propose a number of defence projects of common European interest to ensure that major projects can get off the ground and can be designed, built and deployed on European soil”, she stressed. To oversee this work, Ms von der Leyen will propose “a full-time Defence Commissioner to support and invest in a cutting-edge European defence industry”.
She said that one of this Commissioner’s first tasks would be to present, together with the new High Representative of the Union, a ‘white paper’ on European defence preparations, “which should also include the threat posed by disinformation and manipulation” of information. “The idea will be to determine where we need to invest, how much and how best to go about it while we draw up the new long-term European budget”, explained Ms von der Leyen. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)