‘About Face!’
In a recent article in the Guardian1 about the future
of UKs maritime patrol and reconnaissance aircraft capability some interesting
views were expressed by the UKs current Defence Secretary, Philip Hammond, with
regards to the US ‘pivot’ of its military assets from Europe to the Asia
Pacific region.
Philip Hammond criticised Europe’s collective defence
capability and suggested that the intervention in Libya had “cruelly exposed”
some limitations of some European countries, but what are these limitations? For
some examples we need look no further than the current UK government’s cost
cutting led SDSR (Strategic Defence and Security Review). That review axed the
£4bn Nimrod replacement, the Harrier force (the UKs fixed wing carrier capable
aircraft) and will lead to drastic cuts to troop numbers leaving the UK with many
of the defence gaps he’s likely referring too.
Naturally his comments are directed at European allies in
NATO, particularly Germany, and to be fair I do agree with this, but we should
beware of hypocrisy. That said the UK and France together account for the vast
majority of European defence spending. But if the UK government and Philip
Hammond believe countries like Germany should begin contributing more then, in
my view, the best way to achieve this is through the EU.
As I’ve mentioned elsewhere in this blog2 Germany
and other EU members are supportive of a European military whereas the UK
stands in opposition to this. Instead we need to take a more pragmatic approach
and allow those countries who see the sense in pooling military resources to do
so, whilst at the same time having our own reservations respected. I do not
think this risks further division between Britain and the EU, but rather speeds
up progress of the EU project. Another reason I doubt this would lead to
divisions is because of France, their strong Gaulist tradition of independence
is similar to opinion of many in the UK and they would likely want to maintain
a similar level of independence as the UK.
Philip Hammond is right that Europe needs to pull its weight,
especially now we cannot guarantee that the Americans will make up our
capability gaps. However the most cost effective way to get the Germans et al
to do this is through the EU.
1 The Guardian, 05/12/2012, ‘Unmanned drones
likely to take over Nimrod spy duties’, http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2012/dec/05/unmanned-drone-nimrod-spy-plane
Accessed 20/12/2012
2 Eurofile, 26/11/2012, ‘An argument for a
European Union Security Force’, http://euro-file.blogspot.in/2012/11/an-argument-for-european-union-security.html