Europe is nowhere near any of that even their ‘peace keeping’ and ‘humanitarian’ aide is under manned.
What I understand and adhere to is aligning the military equipement and communications (this is what the 1st stage would be from what I have heard). It’s going to be a long painful business. As I said before NATO is still and for the forseeable future will be the centre of EU countries defese policies.
My idea is that that could lead to the EU being more useful to NATO at least for this foreseeable future.
This is why I think people particularly the anglo-saxons are jumping ahead (scare mongering) it really isn’t as enormous as all that. It might become which will probably depend on what the future holds.
France can not even keep what it’s got in working order with the amount they spend it’s embarrassing if you ask me.
Of course France has great technology combined with some other states and I think that after the 1st steps it is using this and involving other European states in the eventually production that will drive things forward.
Remaining divided spells greater dangers.
We’ve tried centuries of divided Europe and it has been a long litany of war and destruction.
And I kept reading that we had the EEC (/EU) to thank for ending that, without a military component at all?
At least no one should be afraid of the Bundeswehr. Doesn’t seem that long ago when that fact would have been celebrated, how times have changed.
Exactly, and it would be great if it could continue like that, but it looks like the US is no longer the stable partner it has always been and therefore it’s understandable if there is a discussion about the future direction.
If there is a point in any European country having an army, then there is a point in trying to coordinate between nations.
We are not divided. But there has to be at least a recognition of sovereignty at some point. The development of PESCO to what I suspect will be a pan European military alliance renders it difficult for smaller nations to have control or autonomy. It is not required, and as long as the debate has been ongoing there still are no compelling rationales presented as to why it might be needed?
Divided Europe no longer exists, ergo war is not looming. For me the greater threat is a homogeneous Europe ruled centrally with no great requirement to listen to voices of concern.
One small example that shows the current beurocracy of EU gone wild.
Turf (peat) cutting is to be banned fully in Ireland due to the EU declaring it non environmental.
Now we import peat products, that we produced in Ireland for a century. From Germany. Makes no sense and our fucked up Government nodding and smiling and doffing hats to the EU mandarins instead of telling them to politely fuck off.
As the United States of Europe develops our autonomy as nations will cease to exist.
The PESCO prohect is just the start
NATO has taken massive credibility hits under the leadership of the US and there is a very real question if the US would honour article 5. I am no longer so sure.
An EU army would certainly be extremely helpful if Europe is to have a credible voice in geopolitics and it is bizarre to me to see how much stick Flobs is getting for writing what I see to be mostly quite sensible stuff. Because as a power block, the EU can never be a counter weight to the US without a credible and potent defence organisation and relying only on NATO has perhaps become quite unwise after Trump, as well as Bidens Afghan withdrawal.
I for one hope France manages to persuade Germany of the necessity of this now that stumble block and obvious veto power for anything like this, the UK, is gone. It would make Brexit a bit more positive for the EU at least.
I disagree with @Flobs. But be fair, I am not giving him or anyone else “stick”.
I am anti EU army. Thats all.
Sorry, meant no offence. You are probably right.
But yeah, pro and cons with an EU army and many opinions.
Looks like a period of tit for tat ya boo sucks ‘diplomacy’ for the next couple of years. Can’t wait until the grownups come home.
Too late for me to watch this and I’ll be out all day tomorrow.
Something brewing in Poland I see.
Difficult to get that one here now.
There’s a big problem here which the French don’t want to admit.
It’s true that a large proportion of French boats that fished in UK waters when the UK was in the EU have been refused a licence.
This is because they have been asked to evidence their previous fishing activity but many of them can’t, because they were fishing illegally. This permit system, and the agreed criteria for granting licences, is being implemented properly by the UK but it’s catching out French boats that cannot document their previous activities.
Yes, however you can not look at everything in the perspective of law, legality. This dispute over fishing rughts has been going on for decades and will not dissappear over night because of legality. So far it’s been very much tit for tat and tittle tatter. Now it looks like, due to UK obstinance, to be heading to another level. This UK stance will just increase ‘illegal’ fishing, endanger navigation in the channel (as fishing vessels turn off their geo-localisation more and more).
At some point responsibilities have to be taken. If this carries on we could see many naval vessels patrolling channel waters when they could be doing other stuff more useful to the military.
I’m in the camp of ban fishing all together however I do understand that compromise is necessary sometimes.