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EU Agrees to Boost Military Cooperation but Doubts Remain
- localcdn 9y agohttps://archive.fo/FbiB8 https://archive.fo/FbiB8
- Devagamster 9y agoYoure a legend
- absrnd 9y agoPaywall
- YouAreGreat 9y agoWSJ seems to be privileged in that regard. Others get flagged down fast, WSJ stays up.
- atmosx 9y agoThis comes mostly to fill up the void that UK will leave in the E.U. by exiting and ofc is not going to fly. As the article states, the level of integration required for these kind of things is nowhere to be found. The European Union is at crossroads: Either integrates and disintegrates. Half-measures like the ones proposed by the new French PM are not going to work. Not to mention that is nearly impossible for him to achieve anything substantial against Berlin. It's like an ancient Greek tragedy. Everybody tries to make his best, while every action of every key-player leads inevitably to the worst possible outcome.
- agumonkey 9y agoit's a very recurrent case under pressure
- legulere 9y agoTo the contrary, this was planned since decades, but the UK was always blocking it. I don't know which void this is supposed to fill, as military was not really part of the EU up until now.
- craigsmansion 9y ago> This comes mostly to fill up the void that UK will leave in the E.U. by exiting and ofc is not going to fly. Alternatively, this has been in the making for a long time, but always has been kept back by the UK to support their relevance inside of the EU. Why do you state that it "[of course] is not going to fly"? Can you refer to some similar situations that provide precedent for your prediction? > The European Union is at crossroads Why? And why at this particular point in time? Is it because the UK is leaving, or are there any other reasons the EU cannot maintain their current course? > Not to mention that is nearly impossible for him to achieve anything substantial against Berlin. How so? Is the EU colluding with Germany to the detriment of the other member states? Can you provide any evidence of this? > Everybody tries to make his best, while every action of every key-player leads inevitably to the worst possible outcome. Do you mean for this particular endeavour or their policies in general? Because in general the results of the EU up to this point seem far from the worst possible outcome. If you mean this particular policy, why do you believe it will lead to the worst possible outcome in this specific instance?
- msabalau 9y agoThe notion that a parallel from of coordination between underfunded militarys either materially threatened British relevance in the EU in the past or acts in any substantial way to replace it's military might in the event the EU needed to act outside of NATO in the future is extremely dubious. However minimal this effort is, it is certainly wise given Brexit, increasing influence of isolationists and nationalists in the US, and Russia's appetite for power projection.
- polotics 9y agoHi craigsmansion. A lot of the answers to your questions start by looking at the Target2 imbalances, I think. Also the widening gaps between yields on sovereign bonds from EU countries. Germany is refusing Euro-Bonds, profitting from the end of the competitive-devaluationS era of european economics, so far the EU seems to have been just a mercantile bait-and-switch.
- pavpanchekha 9y agoI don't think this is quite right. France has pushed for EU military integration for a long time, mostly because France would like the German economy powering French foreign policy goals. (France is quite active on the world stage, including recent interventions in Mali and Libya and a large role in the CJTF-OIR against ISIS.) The British would instead prefer Europe act through NATO, where European goals will be married to American ones, and has blocked an EU Army for a long time. Now that the UK is leading, France is pushing the EU Army idea once again.
- gaius 9y agoThis comes mostly to fill up the void that UK will leave in the E.U. by exiting and ofc is not going to fly There has been a Franco-German formation for 30 years now, it's never actually deployed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franco-German_Brigade https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franco-German_Brigade But the EU for all its pretensions never "kept the peace in Europe" - that was NATO, and unless Corbyn is elected[1], there's no chance of the UK leaving. [1] https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/aug/19/jeremy-corbyn-dismissal-nato-trident https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/aug/19/jeremy...
- ralfn 9y agoI think we have a strong selection bias for problems. We are here and where we are now was also deemed impossible. Slow and steady wins the race. People with excessive opinion and limited knowledge don't last decades. It's how change sneaks in.
- sverige 9y agoThe title is misleading. It's a renewed attempt to begin achieving more cooperation, small steps, not integration.
- pjc50 9y agoNote that this is some pretty lukewarm collaboration, and not the "EU army" that the usual suspects will try to paint it as. The real question is how this relates to NATO; I suspect that sensible people have realised that perhaps they can no longer rely on the US, UK, or for that matter Turkey. Undoubtedly there's some sort of arms industry boondoggling going on too. There always is.
- 3pt14159 9y agoHow is the UK no longer reliable? Even the US is probably reliable for Nato defence outside of Cyber where war looks more like espionage. The world does need the EU to step up it's leadership, but we're not at a breaking point yet. I also think that a coalition of France, Canada, and the UK could act as a decision making block in light of the political situation in America right now. The UK is still one of the most powerful atomic weapons armed countries and has good relations with many countries around the world, France is the most powerful / stable EU country with good relations with many countries around the world, and Canada could act as a good representative for North America and has enough soft power and reputation to pull together non-aligned countries and other members of the global liberal order.
- pjc50 9y ago> coalition of France, Canada, and the UK could act as a decision making bloc The UK can't decide its way out of a paper bag at the moment. See other comment; while the permanent state yet functions, the political leadership is a mess and we're still discussing whether it's a good idea to collapse our major export industries or not.
- chrisseaton 9y ago> sensible people have realised that perhaps they can no longer rely on the ... UK What's the UK done to your or anyone else in Europe to make them think that their military is not reliable any more? UK military commitment to Europe was always via NATO so will not change under Brexit, and the UK still provides the headquarters and much of the troops for the cooperative formations in Europe such as ARC. UK troops are on the ground in eastern Europe right now in the NATO EFP against Russia, providing I think (couldn't find a source right now) more troops than anyone else is.
- Feniks 9y agoWith reason. The military isn't something us Euros like to spend money on, the US has been whining about European NATO commitments since day 1. Healthcare, housing, education, infrastructure. Those are the things I take pride in. Not a new airforce jet.
- gaius 9y agoThose are the things I take pride in. Not a new airforce jet. But those things would never have happened without US defence spending, because the Europeans would have had to spend that money defending the Fulda Gap from the Third Shock Army. Doing that and funding a welfare state would indeed be something to be proud of, but don't kid yourself that Europe achieved this by its own effort.
- bobthechef 9y agoQuite the spoiled and childish attitude. Most NATO members aren't contributing the minimum and instead effectively externalize defense to the US. Then they make comments like yours that trivialize the importance of defense. At least the military leaders of the Eastern flank of NATO, located as it is on a geopolitical seismic fault and with Russia at arm's length, better appreciate the importance of defense. Of course, relying on the Eastern flank to function as a buffer without is, again, foolish and yet another blow to the beyond dubious solidarity of EU member states. (I am reminded of the Polish-Soviet war of 1920 and the Western attitudes then.) This has nothing to do with any pride. It has everything to do with security and survival. Without it, all those other things you mentioned you can kiss goodbye.
- jopsen 9y ago> Quite the spoiled and childish attitude. Most NATO members aren't contributing the minimum and instead effectively externalize defense to the US. There is no minimum. There is a non-binding spending target at 2% of GDP for 2020. Much of Eastern Europe is understandably already hitting that. Some of western Europe won't hit the targets. I for one understand why increased military spending (and international deployments) is a sensitive subject in Germany. But, nobody says the US have to be a 3.6% of GDP. Maybe you should target for 3% of GDP and spend some money on free education and healthcare. Maybe you could even go to 2% of GDP. See: http://money.cnn.com/2017/05/25/news/nato-trump-defense-spending/index.html http://money.cnn.com/2017/05/25/news/nato-trump-defense-spen...
- jknz 9y agoI would love to see a European Union where other EU countries have a say in the main election of each country. Say, all EU countries can vote for the chancellor election in Germany and these votes weight 5% of the final results, while the German votes weight 95%. Same for the French presidential election, other EU countries could vote for a weight of 5%, and 95% of the weight is given the French votes. This could happen slowly, countries joining one by one the system: when a country joins, it offers 5% of its main election(s) to other EU countries, and in exchange it can vote for other EU countries main elections. This would oblige national politicians to address the concerns of European citizens outside of their country. This would be very welcome since the choices of national politicians do not just affect the lives of the nationals, but if affects the lives of other Europeans too. As the national economies are all strongly intertwined and the economic choices of one EU country very affects others, two solutions come to mind: (a) a strong federal government like in the US, where the decisions of state politicians barely affect other states; (b) to keep the current system where national politicians can make choices that affect all Europeans, but let all Europeans have a say in their election.
- jopsen 9y agoForget it. It would be an administrative nightmare. You would have to vote 28 / 4 times per year!!! It would have little effect, but MASSIVE push back. These years the EU needs to lay low, and focus on doing good without drawing more people to support the extreme right-wing/neo-nazis. This is not the time for bold moves in western Europe; this could back-fire. There are some wiggle room for playing hard ball in eastern Europe, like getting Romanian prisons into ECHR compliance.
- ivan_gammel 9y agoTechnically, election cycles may be aligned or foreign vote may be indirect - there are ways to improve voter experience. But I would agree: public opinion will be strongly against it, because these 5% of votes would for example play definitive role in last German election.
- ivan_gammel 9y ago
- chiaro 9y agoCooperative military operations will be great for shoring up European unity and validating more integration in due course. The UK being out of the picture should help (as does the existential threat that Brexit has painted) but the system of half-measures too well suits Germany to make it easy. This has all been true with a fiscal union too.