Europe warned to overhaul military forces

European defence ministers will seek today to push forward efforts to modernise their forces a day after an influential Washington think-tank warned they must urgently overhaul the military to defend Europe’s interests against terrorists, failed states and regional crises.

The report, drafted by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, said continued European inability to face up to 21st Century threats could undermine the Atlantic alliance as America’s military might increasingly dwarfs that of its NATO allies.

“Failure to meaningfully improve Europe’s collective defence capabilities in the coming years would have profoundly negative impacts on the ability of European countries to protect their interests, the viability of NATO as an alliance and the ability of European countries to partner the US in any meaningful way” warned former German defence chief Gen. Klaus Naumann and US Gen. Joseph Ralston, NATO’s top commander in Europe until 2003.

European nations have been working through NATO and the EU to build up their defence capacity in recent years, but the report yesterday said European governments – often hamstrung by budget constraints – have failed to move forward fast enough.

“European leaders have generally lacked the political will to do what is necessary to close this strategy-capabilities gap,” said the report. “Progress has been slow and uneven.”

The head of the EU’s new European Defence Agency – set up to co-ordinate purchases of new military equipment – is expected to echo many of the report’s concerns when he addresses ministers Thursday at the RAF Lyneham base in western England.

Nick Whitney, the EDA’s chief executive, wants EU governments to commit to open up closely protected defence markets to allow for the development of pan-European companies that would pool research and compete with US rivals.

Ministers are expected to discuss plans for a non-bonding ”code of conduct” that would make it easier for European defence firms to compete across borders within the bloc. Currently defence has been largely excluded from EU rules that have torn down barriers to trade within Europe, allowing nations to protect national champions with military contracts.

EU ministers are expected to adopt the code at their next meeting in November, opening up markets from next year.

Liberalising the fragmented European market is one of the key recommendations of the CSIS report. Others include more pooling of military resources among European nations, something which nations have increasingly been looking at to share facilities such as big transport planes and satellite surveillance.

At today’s meeting at least six EU nations are expected to launch preparations to jointly acquire air-to-air refuelling planes – another area where Europe lags far behind the US.

With a sluggish economy contracting defence spending, the CSIS experts say Europe should aim to switch spending from away from personnel costs toward research and up-to-date hardware.

EU defence officials seeking reform point out that the bloc collectively has the world’s second-largest defence budget, but about half of the around €200bn goes on military salaries. The US spends five times as much on defence research.