The North Atlantic Alliance (NATO) should not be afraid to create a European Union (EU) army – it just needs to accept it. This statement was made by the Minister of the Armed Forces (AF) of France, Florence Parley.
“Defense Europe is not built against NATO, quite the contrary: strengthening Europe will strengthen and increase the viability of the alliance,” she said in Reuters October 22.
The publication also recalled that the theme of the creation of a pan-European army has become topical again in the context of a quarrel between France and the members of the new tripartite AUKUS alliance – Australia, Great Britain and the United States. .
On September 2, Josep Borrell, the European Union’s supreme president for foreign and security policy, announced that the final defense and security project “the EU’s strategic compass” will be ready by October -November. It was indicated that in its design, the document would be close to EU doctrine and NATO’s strategic concept.
In turn, the Secretary General of the North Atlantic Alliance, Jens Stoltenberg, said that the creation of common European armed forces could have negative effects in the form of a weakening of NATO and a disunity of the European Union itself.
He clarified that the root of the problem is the financial question, since 80% of NATO defense spending falls on alliance allies, which are not included in the list of EU member states. The United States, Great Britain, Iceland, Norway, Canada and Turkey, which are at the same time key players in ensuring European security, fall into this category.
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