European Commission Chief Ursula von der Leyen said there is an “urgent” need for EU member states to ramp up military capabilities while apparently pushing towards a collective European Army over the potential threat of a war with Russia.
Speaking before the European Parliament meeting in Strasbourg, France on Wednesday, EU Cheif Ursula von der Leyen said that the bloc needs to begin working on a “European security architecture” in light of the alleged danger posed by Moscow, which she argued represented a threat not only on “the battlefield but across all our society”.
“The threats to our security, our prosperity and our way of life come in many different forms, and we all know them. Some of them are obvious, some of them are hazier on the surface. Be it tackling political interference, reducing our dangerous dependencies – a policy I have called de-risking – or be it eliminating hostile actors from our critical infrastructure. We Europeans must be on guard,” she said.
Therefore the EU boss called on member states to “move fast” in ramping up their military capabilities, urging for a “turbocharging our defence industrial capacity in the next five years.”
“The threat of war may not be imminent, but it is not impossible. The risks of war should not be overblown, but they should be prepared for. And that starts with the urgent need to rebuild, replenish and modernise Member States’ armed forces,” von der Leyen said.
The EU chief, who was largely seen as ‘falling upwards’ from her previous position as Angela Merkel’s Defence Minister to her current role, was previously criticised for leaving the German military in a “catastrophic” condition and therefore precipitated the present-day lack of military readiness in Europe.
The failure of European allies to meet their NATO commitments has been a longstanding bone of contention for former President Donald Trump, who has accused the bloc of taking advantage of the American taxpayer to underwrite their security.
Last year, major European economies including France, Denmark, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Spain, among others, all failed to meet the NATO defence spending requirement of 2 per cent of GDP.
The EU chief also stressed the importance of “European sovereignty”, meaning more centralised power in the hands of unelected Eurocrats in Brussels at the expense of national sovereignty of the national governments of member states.
“European sovereignty will make our partnerships stronger. It will never affect the importance and the need for our NATO alliance. In fact, a more sovereign Europe, in particular on defence, is vital to strengthening NATO,” von der Leyen argued.
She went on to announce that the Commission will put forward proposals for its “first-ever European Industrial Defence Strategy”, which von der Leyen said will seek collective procurement of weapons and munitions similar to how the bloc negotiated for coronavirus vaccines or natural gas following the war in Ukraine.
Additionally, the EU chief announced plans to set up an “Office for Defence Innovation” in Kyiv, Ukraine, which she said will bring Ukraine closer towards integration into the European Union and for member states to learn lessons learned by the Ukrainian military in its two years of war with Russia. Von der Leyen also said that she would be backing the creation of a new position of “Defence Commissioner” for the next European Commission to coordinate Europe’s defence strategy.
The commission president’s remarks in Strasbourg come amid growing calls for the formation of a fully-fledged EU Army. Last month, for example, Italian Deputy Prime Minister Antonio Tajani said that if the European Union wants to be “bearers of peace in the world, we need a European army”.
“National resistance to sharing even these ‘pieces of sovereignty’ will always be strong, but if we remain divided we will always be defenceless sparrows in a world where eagles fly,” the centre-right politician said.
The comments from von der Leyen also came just two days after French President Emmanuel Macron declared that he could not “rule out” sending troops into Ukraine and directly fighting with the Russians, an event which would likely trigger a Third World War.
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