In the face of an increase in hybrid attacks, former Finnish President Sauli Niinistö has called for the gradual establishment of an intelligence cooperation service within the European Union, in a report submitted on Wednesday 30 October to the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, on how to strengthen Europe’s civil and defence preparedness.
“We must prepare together for threats that affect us all and that are too great for any one Member State to tackle alone”, declared Sauli Niinistö at a press conference.
Among the examples he cited was the need to pay more attention to how perpetrators of hybrid threats operate “in order to recognise their tactics and be able to guard against their attacks”.
He recommends setting up an anti-sabotage network that brings together the relevant expertise to provide support at the request of a Member State “faced with serious threats to its critical infrastructure”.
In addition, strengthening intelligence cooperation is, in his view, “crucial to ensuring that the EU is prepared for threats”. The work of counter-espionage at the level of the EU institutions must be strengthened, he says.
On this sensitive issue, the report calls for a proposal to be developed “together with Member States on the modalities of a fully-fledged intelligence cooperation service at the EU level that can serve both the strategic and operational needs of policy planning decision-making without emulating the tasks of Member States’ national intelligence organisations, including in respect of their role in intelligence gathering”.
War with Russia. The new preparedness planning must take into account the threat of armed aggression from Russia. “Putin made it clear 10 years ago that he considered the West to be weak. We need to change his perception”, stressed the former Finnish President.
He recommends clearly defining, within the framework of EU-NATO cooperation, how to “work together” to come to the aid of the Member State under attack, using all the means that the European Union has at its disposal.
Industry. “We need to accelerate our efforts to strengthen the EU’s defence industrial base”, said the report’s author, who believes that strategic capability in Europe needs to be stepped up and the capacity to produce battlefield equipment increased. “It is necessary for our ability to help Ukraine for as long as it takes and to improve our deterrent capability”, said the former president.
“ Preparation has a cost, but it is less than the cost we would incur if we were faced with a major crisis. EU resources must be used, and this is a task that will have to wait until the next multiannual financial framework”, added Sauli Niinistö.
The report suggests using the forthcoming White Paper on the future of European defence to “frame an ambitious long-term policy, with a view to concrete steps forward”, such as identifying and mapping Member States’ urgent defence needs or revising the EU politico-military ‘Headline Goal’ to take account of large-scale external aggression.
Budget. The report suggests that all relevant instruments in all sectors should allocate a certain amount to preparedness actions in their respective areas, so that, for example, “at least 20% of the overall EU budget contributes to the EU’s security and crisis preparedness”.
Ursula von der Leyen told the press that the EU needed to change its mindset. “Preparedness must be part of the underlying logic of all our actions and cover all threats and risks”, she maintained. She pointed out that “Putin’s war against Ukraine is the greatest threat to our security. This year, Russia’s defence spending is set to exceed the collective figures for all EU Member States combined. So we need to redouble our efforts”, she insisted.
On 20 March, Ms von der Leyen and EU High Representative Josep Borrell asked Mr Niinistö to draw up this report on Europe’s civil and defence preparedness (see EUROPE 13377/4).
Link to the report: https://aeur.eu/f/e2w (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)