When the subject of European defence arises it is not the so-called European Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) that is really under discussion. It is Europe’s defence capability provided by European countries in Nato that matters.
The Lisbon Treaty contains a clause – known as the “mutual defence clause” – which states in fairly vague language that if a member State is the victim of an armed attack on its territory “it can rely on the aid and assistance of the other member states, which are obliged to help”.
But the only real teeth available to Europe in a military crisis are those deployed by European members of Nato. It is they who provide the military backbone to CFSP. In every other respect, CFSP should be viewed as a limited diplomatic arm of the EU with the full panoply of a High Representative and a diplomatic corps but, otherwise, signifying little.
It is only Nato that can respond to a military threat. Or can it? And in what way does consideration of the state of European defence affect Malta as “a neutral State actively pursuing peace… by pursuing a policy of non-alignment and refusing to participate in any military alliance”?
As a neutral country, we are dependent in a crisis on the rather vague wording of the Lisbon Treaty mutual defence clause promising to “rely on the aid and assistance (my italics) of other member states”. Compare this wording with the robust commitment of Nato alliance countries that “an attack on one constitutes an attack on all”, which would automatically trigger the appropriate military response.
Given the crisis in Libya and the possible Isis threat, should Malta join Nato as the guarantor of its security? The prospect of anybody ‘invading’ or ‘attacking’ Malta is the stuff of fevered imaginations.
This island is no longer of strategic military importance, although, as a European Christian country close to Libya, it may be as vulnerable to rogue terrorist attacks as any other EU country.
Joining a military alliance, even one as powerful as Nato, is of little value in this age of ‘asymmetric warfare’. Both France and Denmark are members of Nato. This did not prevent the recent atrocities in Paris and Copenhagen. On balance, our best course is to remain neutral and to avoid military entanglements.
But this does not mean standing idly by. I agree entirely with Maurice Calleja that Malta’s armed forces are professional and good enough to make a small military contribution to any European peacekeeping force or, indeed, any military operation against jihadist terrorists invoked under the mutual defence clause of CFSP.
I would go further and argue that – and this is an important proviso – given modern weapons and greater firepower, the Armed Forces of Malta would be capable of defending Malta in the highly unlikely event of a military attack on the island until external support arrived in the form envisaged under the Lisbon Treaty.
The need for Germany, Britain and France – as well as other Nato European states – to rebuild and maintain modern armed forces is paramount
The AFM’s performance over the last 15 years in Somalia and in its search and rescue roles at sea and in the air have been professional, effective and up to the operational calibre of many small and medium-sized countries in Nato.
But assessing threats to European security exposes the wider question of Europe’s military capability. As they met with President Vladimir Putin of Russia to negotiate a ceasefire in Ukraine a few weeks ago, Angela Merkel and Francois Hollande must have felt they were repeating the role of Neville Chamberlain at Munich in 1938. They might have recalled the words of the music-loving German soldier-king, Frederick the Great: “Diplomacy without arms is like music without instruments.”
As events have unfolded, Merkel and Hollande must be wondering how they could have been more hopeful than realistic. Hope has never been a principle of war. And probably no better as a principle of diplomacy either.
Russia is continuing a five-year military build-up with expenditure of about four per cent of GDP annually.
Meanwhile, most Nato countries are running their forces down. In 2014, 23 of Nato’s members failed to reach the two per cent of GDP target set by the alliance. The three most important European members – Britain, France and Germany – are this year spending 1.88 per cent, 1.5 per cent and 1.09 per cent of GDP respectively. Across Europe, manpower has been slashed, weapons procurement programmes halted and systems dismantled without being replaced.
The prime task of any State is to safeguard the security of its citizens. By falling short of the Nato commitment to dedicate two per cent of GDP to defence, European states are neglecting this basic duty. Eastern Europe is under threat from Putin and the continent adjoins a Middle East in turmoil. Europe faces a menace on two fronts: Russia and Isis.
One of the problems is that Britain and France have their eyes on other military threats. As the only countries with the capability and the will to intervene in Africa and the Middle East, their armies are being rebuilt around the concept of lighter, rapid deployment forces. But the potential threat in Eastern Europe – specifically in the Ukraine and the Baltic States – requires the use of old-style, conventional Cold War armaments, principally tanks.
‘The military balance’, an assessment of military forces around the world, shows the German army, which at the end of the Cold War included eight Panzer divisions, now has a few weak brigades with increasingly obsolescent equipment and, in all, only some 63,000 active soldiers. While interventions in the Middle East or Africa would be unthinkable for Germany, in Central Europe and the Baltic States, with the overriding imprimatur of Nato’s article 5 (“an attack on one constitutes an attack on all”), it is different. Here, the German army could fill a far more powerful role playing to its historic strengths.
The German Defence Minister recently said in Berlin that Russia “was now trying to establish geostrategic power politics and military force as a form of asserting their interests”. It has therefore announced that Germany is to review its defence strategy in the light of the conflict in the Ukraine. A new approach was needed, she said, on how to respond when diplomacy failed. She characterised Germany’s role – in a typically understated German manner – as “leading from the middle”.
Germany can best do this by reconstituting its Panzer troops. I commanded a nuclear artillery battery in Germany at the height of the Cold War. Those of us who operated alongside the Bundeswehr always knew that there was something in the German DNA that made them outstanding armoured warriors, imbued with the spirit of field marshals Erwin Rommel and Heinz Guderian. It would not take much to boost the standards of Panzer troops to their former Cold War level.
The need for Germany, Britain and France – as well as other Nato European states – to rebuild and maintain modern armed forces is paramount. The defence of Europe is at stake.
Nato, the EU and their individual constituent members need to shore up their political, diplomatic and military defences against the threats to Europe from Russia in the east and terrorist groups in North Africa and the Middle East in the south.
For CFSP to mean something, it is in Europe’s and Malta’s interests that this should happen.