On Friday 20 February, following a meeting of the E5 (Germany, France, Italy, Poland and the United Kingdom) in Krakow, the British Deputy Defence Minister, Luke Pollard, announced the launch of the LEAP initiative “for low-cost effectors”.
“The problem is to be effective at shooting down relatively low-cost missiles, drones and other threats facing us. We need to make sure that we’re matching the cost of the threats with the cost of defence”, he stressed, adding that each member of the E5 had made a multi-million pound and multi-million euro commitment to advancing this technology.
The minister pointed out that the aim was to study how to develop land and other capabilities, drawing on their collective experience, and to encourage the defence industries of each of the E5 countries to take up this challenge. “We very much hope that this project will result in an effective effector that will be operational within 12 months”, he explained.
“We wish to benefit from innovative systems, counter drone systems and produce them at low cost and in great quantities. This is of utmost importance and to do so we would like to bring in the best companies and win them over to join in this initiative in all of our countries”, added German Minister Boris Pistorius. “It is an unconventional approach but within the group of five we had planned on embarking upon these new paths together. And if LEAP proves to be effective, it can become a role model for other areas”, he explained.
More generally, the E5 ministers called for the strengthening of their defence capabilities, by increasing investment in defence, but also by developing the European defence industry.
According to the German minister, while the NATO summit in The Hague was about money, the next one, in Ankara, will be about capabilities. “We are going to instruct our national arms directors to define these essential capabilities in order to define the next steps. What can we do next? One idea could be to consider the idea of a joint tanker fleet or multi-domain task force, or even a European version of ‘Five Eyes’ (intelligence-sharing alliance between Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States, editor’s note). This option is possible and the mandate was given”, announced Boris Pistorius.
“In addition to increasing the budget, we must also ensure that this money is quickly translated into military equipment”, stressed France’s Catherine Vautrin, stressing the need for European industries to be able to respond to orders. “But we also need to strengthen our coordination in operational terms. Together, we must be ready to respond to any eventuality. We will be working on this at our next meeting”, she added.
“We are determined to accelerate the training of our armed forces, strengthen their capabilities and increase the resilience of our societies”, stressed Polish Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz for his part.
The E5 also discussed the fight against hybrid threats. On this subject, the Italian Undersecretary of Defence, Isabella Rauti, announced that she wanted to “create, or contribute to the creation of, a European Centre for combating hybrid warfare, focused on predictive risk analysis, in order to strengthen (the) capacity to respond to threats”.
The ministers also discussed NATO’s European pillar. “We all know collectively that we need to move towards a more European NATO, and we are obviously working on this with a view to the next summit in Ankara”, said Catherine Vautrin.
Lastly, the ministers reiterated their support for Ukraine. “Ensuring Ukraine’s long-term sovereignty and security must be an integral part of any peace agreement, and any settlement must be backed by robust security guarantees for Ukraine”, they said in a joint statement.
According to Catherine Vautrin, the next meeting of E5 ministers is scheduled to take place before the summer, prior to the Ankara summit (7-8 July) in France. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)