On Tuesday 9 July, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg called for a stronger transatlantic industrial base. He announced that a new defence industrial pledge would be signed at the NATO summit in Washington on 10 and 11 July.
“All NATO Allies will sign a new defence industrial pledge, and that will be a pledge that will help to make our industries stronger, more innovative and more capable of large-scale production”, he explained at the Defense Industry Forum organised by the US Chamber of Commerce.
According to US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, this should make it possible to strengthen the defence industrial capacity of NATO countries. “Like our defence spending commitment, these individual pledges are critical to our collective security. They will enable the Alliance to prioritise the production of the most vital defence equipment we would need in the event of conflict”, he explained. In his view, these pledges will also help to forge new industrial partnerships within the Alliance, create jobs and strengthen economic competitiveness, and encourage greater investment in technology and innovation.
Mr Stoltenberg pointed out that there could be no solid defence without solid defence industries. For him, the war in Ukraine showed that the Allies not only had too little production capacity, but also gaps in their interoperability. The pledge that will be made should also make it possible to strengthen the measures to be taken to guarantee better interoperability of the Allies’ equipment, according to the Secretary General.
Jens Stoltenberg called for the Allies to “spend better by spending more together”, highlighting collaborations such as the F35 fighter aircraft, manufactured in several allied countries, or the Gripen and Scalp.
For Kathleen Hicks, US Deputy Secretary of Defense, “we buy capabilities together, and from each other, not because we have no other choice, but because our interoperability and the strength of our collective industrial base is a force multiplier”. Ms Hicks said that the growth in the defence industry’s capacity needed to be accelerated, with more production lines, more factories and new producers. “Expanding transatlantic defence industrial capacity is not a nice-to-do. It is a need-to-do”, she warned, pointing out that the Allies needed multinational supplies on a larger scale. According to the Deputy Secretary of Defense, the Allies must continue to secure supply chains, adapt more quickly to new technologies and improve the interoperability and interchangeability of equipment.
Mr Stoltenberg pointed out that last year the NATO Support and Procurement Agency signed contracts worth more than $11 billion for munitions and capabilities.
He also stressed the importance of close collaboration with partners, including Ukraine. Kyiv is to open an office in Washington to be closer to the US defence industry. “We also must step up international defence industry cooperation with like-minded democracies wherever we can, with NATO Allies and non-NATO partners”, added Ms Hicks.
Acknowledging that while for years the expression ‘arsenal of democracy’ was understood to refer to American defence, “those days are long over”, the Deputy Secretary stressed. “Today’s arsenal of democracy is not only American, it’s not only Western, either; today’s arsenal of democracy is global”, she concluded.
Strengthening European defence
On the evening of 9 July, at an event organised by the EU delegation to the United States, to which Agence Europe was invited, the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell, reiterated that Europeans were working to strengthen their defence industry, which will have “an important role in the near future”. Mr Borrell once again called for greater predictability for this industry, which “needs to know what the future demand will be in order to justify today’s investments”.
The High Representative stressed that Europeans had to spend more and spend in Europe. “If you want European countries to increase their defence budgets - which is what the Americans are asking Europeans to do - that means we have to produce more in Europe”, he said. According to him, European defence spending has increased by 30% over the last three years, and Europeans together spend 1.9% of their GDP on defence.
“It’s not enough, but it’s much better (than before) and it’s increasing”, explained Mr Borrell.
“Our defence initiatives are designed (to produce more in Europe): to increase our production capacity, to make our industries bigger and more efficient. But this does not exclude US companies based in the EU that meet the security requirements”, added the High Representative.
Furthermore, while to prevent a Russian victory in Ukraine we need to increase European industrial capacities, “put more money on the table” and strengthen technological development, “Europe’s awakening, however necessary, must not imply that the United States should remain quiet”, he warned.
“The defence industry should be strong (...). Democracies should always be better armed than tyrannies”, stressed the Ukrainian Minister for Strategic Industries, Oleksandr Kamyshin, at the EU delegation’s evening event. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)