Europe could pack a bigger punch

By Tim Garden and Charles Grant
Published: 17 December 2002

 

Turkey's lifting of its veto over the agreement that allows the European Union to borrow Nato assets means that the EU will now run its first peacekeeping mission, in Macedonia, in a few months' time. This provides an opportunity to breathe new life into the EU's European security and defence policy. The European governments should put the emphasis on building better-equipped and more capable armed forces. They can do so - despite static defence budgets - as long as they are prepared to pool their capabilities.

This would not mean an EU squadron of fighter aircraft or warships that fly the flag of more than one country. The political sensitivities are too great. But much national defence spending goes on humdrum things such as training, research, repairs, transport, military bases and supply organisations. Each country duplicates the others' efforts. That is the biggest reason why the defence spending of Nato's European members - at about $165bn a year, some 40 per cent of US levels - provides only a small fraction of the US's military punch.

Europe's defence ministries, often reluctant to embrace change, are unlikely to favour much pooling. They will make the fair point that any attempt to merge different national infrastructures is likely to be difficult. Finance ministries, though, are more likely to understand that pooling could lead to significant, long-term savings.

European governments seem to be getting the message. At the Prague summit in November, Nato agreed to establish its own fleet of ground surveillance aircraft. The model is Nato's existing fleet of Awacs early warning aircraft. In the same month, a joint Franco-German paper called for the harmonisation of military requirements and the pooling of capabilities.

Successful examples of pooling include the joint headquarters and support services established by the Belgian and Dutch navies; and the Nordic countries' logistics battalion that has been busy in the Balkans. Economies of scale and overhead give these countries access to more military capability than they could achieve by spending the same money on their own.

Aircraft offer the best opportunities for saving money through pooling because of their high purchase and maintenance costs and the fact that many nations buy the same type. Given that Europe badly needs more air lift, the EU should create a pool of transport aircraft, on a similar basis to the Nato Awacs fleet. It could start off with the 136 Hercules C-130 transport aircraft owned by 10 EU countries. The fleet would be available to EU members, to the EU collectively or to Nato.

Any country taking part should be free to withdraw its aircraft and air crews if some pressing national need took precedence. However, in order to achieve significant cost savings, the fleet would have to operate from one main base, with squadrons dispersed to serve national needs. A single planning, servicing and logistics organisation would support the force. Contributing countries would be able to save money by closing bases, training units and headquarters.

Five smaller EU countries own 430 F-16 fighter aircraft between them. Germany, Italy and the UK operate 570 Tornadoes. Next year those three countries plus Spain will start to deploy Eurofighters. In all these cases, pooling the support operations could yield considerable savings.

Many support activities for land forces could be run in common - for example engineering, communications, transport, medical and logistics services. EU governments should agree common specifications for support services and then approve a list of suppliers that could bid for contracts. Nato already outsources the security guards of its Brussels headquarters to Group 4, a private contractor.

Encouragingly, European governments appear to be getting more serious about capabilities. At the Prague summit one group of countries agreed to procure a pool of 10 to 15 refuelling aircraft (which would still bear national colours). Another decided to collaborate on increasing its stocks of satellite-guided bombs for F-16s by 40 per cent. Nato's decision on airborne ground surveillance points the way to a pooled future.

It does not matter whether a pool of aircraft is branded Nato or EU, since the aircraft would be available to both bodies. If Europeans can improve their capabilities, Nato and the EU will be stronger.

Sir Tim Garden, a former air marshal, is a visiting professor at the Centre for Defence Studies. Charles Grant is director of the Centre for European Reform.