“Now is the time to speak honestly so that every European understands what is at stake. A new international order will be formed in the second half of this decade and beyond.” – European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen
“500 million Europeans ask 300 million Americans to defend them from 140 million Russians. What Europe lacks is the belief that we are truly a global force.” – Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk
Churn through the catchy headlines and grandiose statements across every major news outlet and you will become convinced that decades of relative European negligence towards defense is a thing of the past. Instead, we are about to witness a seismic rejuvenation of the larger European economy, a consolidated European defense environment, and a unified Europe with strategic autonomy ready to take its place as a global power.
Perhaps this projection will ultimately come to fruition.
Certainly, since the aftershocks of the latest Munich Security Conference gathering and the never-ending barrage of U.S. President Donald Trump’s statements regarding Ukraine, Greenland, the Panama Canal and Canada, Europe has been hustling to get its security house in order.
Fearful that the Trump administration is readying a quid-pro-quo arrangement with Russia while preparing to leave the NATO Alliance altogether, the 28 countries of the European Union (EU) – as well as Britain and Norway and others – are scrambling to divine Washington’s intentions while stepping up support for Ukraine’s defense of its territory and national sovereignty.
European leaders were quick to voice support for Ukraine and beleaguered Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in the wake of his uncomfortable meeting with President Trump and Vice-President JD Vance in the Oval Office on February 28.
Moreover, European leaders appear to recognize that what is happening under the Trump administration echoes of something deeper in the United States, whose strategic attention is increasingly fixed on the Asia-Pacific region.
From the European perspective the only weapon left in their arsenal is money, hence the backing by EU leaders of a groundbreaking plan to free up a combined €800 billion ($865 billion) for future military investment under Readiness 2030 initiative.
The cornerstone of this plan is a €150 billion ($162 billion) Security Action for Europe (SAFE) funding package based on long-maturity loans raised on capital markets that are to be used for joint procurement of defense equipment from European industry.
The upshot of this nascent effort is to wean dependency away from U.S.-supplied systems, create a stronger European defense industrial base, improve military readiness and deterrence, and juice the lackluster Eurozone economy in the process.
The end game would be sufficient military readiness with the capability of overseeing security for the EU and those European countries aligned with Brussels without the need of support from Washington.
On paper, all this is good news for Europe – and particularly for European defense primes and their localized supply chains. Cutting out American competitors and creating a thriving internal market undoubtedly has executives at Airbus, Rheinmetall, Leonardo, KDNS, and others salivating at the opportunity before them.
But as with all plans, things put down on paper do not always play out smoothly and straightforwardly.
Instead, a simple look at just a few of the many hurdles ahead should lend one pause before declaring whether this initiative will lead to European strategic autonomy.
Politics.
The first obstacle for Europe is political.
Eager to avoid a lone veto over any proposal, European leaders have been careful to sideline dual EU-NATO member Hungary, whose prime minister – Viktor Orban – is an EU-sceptic and has refused to apply sanctions against Russia or aid to Ukraine.
That step in isolation might make sense for the appearance of unanimity and for isolating a government deemed problematic by Brussels.
But Spain and Italy – two of the larger economies in Europe – are also cool about the EU defense spending package.
Both countries – for different reasons – see the push to spend more on defense, while easing the EU Stability and Growth Pact debt/deficit rules, as excessive and focused too narrowly on military capability. This should come as little surprise as both spend well below the NATO Alliance minimum required standard of 2 percent of annual GDP, and neither government appears eager to balloon defense expenditures and incur higher debt – particularly as each is located farther from Russia’s borders than other fellow EU-NATO states.
Another stalwart dual EU-NATO member – the Netherlands – has also exhibited reluctance about Brussels windfall spending plans for defense.
Indeed, despite all the positivity displayed for news cameras and reporters, Europe still suffers from sharp political divides as it pertains to security and how to conduct relations with Washington.
Economics and Finance.
The second issue – and what looms as the most crucial one for Europe – is the guns versus butter debate.
European taxpayers now face the prospect of being asked to bear greater national expenditure in an area they traditionally do not place a high premium, all while the Eurozone faces high debt loads, persistently lackluster economic growth, and the prospect of tariffs imposed by the Trump administration.
Former German Chancellor Angela Merkel once openly worried that Europe accounted for 7 percent of the world’s population, a quarter of its economic output, and half its social spending.
But to sustain generous helpings of butter and spend more on guns something will have to give.
Both France and the United Kingdom – the two mainstays of European defense – have high public debts and face higher borrowing costs.
While Germany has more fiscal room for maneuver due to its relatively low public debt, its next government will face a public traditionally made uneasy by rising inflation, plus a potentially fractured political environment caused by using a caretaker parliament to bypass the country’s debt brake amendment and push through a roughly EUR1 trillion spending package.
Germany’s economy, meanwhile, continues to struggle. Once the sugar-rush of expected stimulus funding – mostly for infrastructure – wears off, the German voter will confront the choice of whether to pay more in taxes for all the extra spending or push back against inflationary pressures and higher debt financing.
Simply because Brussels makes it easier to spend on defense – up to an additional 1.5 percent of GDP towards military expenditure annually through 2028 – also does not guarantee each European capital takes up the offer.
As for the United Kingdom, which lies outside the EU following its Brexit, lingering hostility to its leaving the union ensured London was frozen out of the SAFE funding pot.
In the meantime, the limited additional funding the Labor government of Keir Starmer has committed towards defense through 2027 does little to move the needle towards a more robust British military capability.
EU defense commissioner, Andrius Kubilius, noted to the European parliament on March 11 that the gaps between what European armies have and what is required to have a deterrent effect on Russia is “colossal”, citing a shortfall of €500 billion ($541 billion) “at least.”
A crucial question to ponder going forward is whether European publics will remain enthused by taking on greater debt expenditure for defense – particularly in a scenario where the Ukraine conflict comes to halt. The difficult reality is that the further away from Russia’s borders, the lesser the impact on public perception of Vladimir Putin and his inner circle as persistent existential threat.
Capabilities Gap.
Then there is the problem of closing the gap in military capabilities vis-à-vis the United States.
Throwing money at the problem is fine for an initial step. It speaks to political commitment and signals to Europe’s defense industrials that the time to rev up production lines is near. It might also lead to the cross-border industrial consolidation European analysts have long been championing, a process which would streamline inefficiencies, create greater economies of scale, and maybe reduce the industrial protectionism that rears its head each time questions of defense procurement arise.
But increased expenditure does little to immediately shrink the capabilities gap that would emerge in the unlikely instance that Washington fully abandons NATO.
Currently the U.S. is the crucial enabler for European operations, providing transport aircraft, drones, intelligence-surveillance-reconnaissance (ISR), command-and-control (C2), long-range strike, aerial refueling, air defense, and numerous other capabilities.
The sheer scale of what is required to quickly replace U.S. support represents a significant lift.
Acquiring and absorbing new systems will take time, while advanced technologies are generally more readily found on the U.S. side of the market than within Europe’s. To utilize the SAFE mechanism, however, purchasers will need to find their wares from within the Eurozone (65 percent of all content), which means European primes will need to ramp up production of tanks, armored vehicles, artillery pieces and munitions to heretofore unseen levels.
Some figures estimate that a credible European deterrent would require a minimum of 1,400 tanks, 2,000 infantry fighting vehicles, and 700 artillery pieces.
To close the capability gap by the 2030 target European industry would therefore need to be placed on a war production footing reminiscent of the U.S. during the Second World War. To do so industry would need to be fed large-volume, high-Euro orders early and often, rather than a series of production orders in dribs and drabs.
Once all the new equipment is purchased and delivered another hurdle arrives: adding more troops.
Beyond just systems and technologies, Europe needs to overcome a tougher problem: demographics. Europe is an aging continent with fewer young people and difficulties continent-wide in attracting individuals to a military career.
Without better recruitment all the new military equipment expected to be acquired is largely rendered useless. Lacking troops to crew, maintain and equip new systems means much of the new stock will have to be donated to Ukrainians doing the actual fighting in Europe, or placed into storage.
There are voices in European politics calling for a return to the previous Cold War-era conscription model, but how popular would that proposal be at the respective national levels? Ultimately the politicians must answer to the voters.
Finally, to facilitate movement of all the new equipment and troops across the continent quickly and efficiently, Europe will need to improve its military mobility and strengthen its logistical tail. As noted in the European Commission’s Joint White Paper, the current environment is impeded by red tape and non-harmonized procedures. EU Defense Commissioner Kubilius is on record stating that at least €70 billion ($76 billion) to begin untangling what has long posed a problem for NATO planners.
Conclusion.
Europe as a “coalition of the willing” is preparing to take a major step towards improving its conventional military deterrent. The parade of summits, photo ops, press conferences, and white papers all point in a common direction: unlocking funding and driving EU partners (and some aligned nations) towards joint procurement from European-based vendors. This is Brussels’ way of trying to square the circle: undertake its own defense without U.S. assistance, while relying upon a flow of armaments from local sources.
Crucial to this will be ensuring the unlocked funding is spent smartly and results in optimized military outputs. That alone is already a difficulty encountered by governments everywhere, be they the United States, Canada, Australia or choose-your-European-nation. Without guarantees that raised defense spending toplines will remain in place several years from now, governments cannot afford to waste billions of taxpayer euros on castles in the air.
In the meantime, all this will have to be done – at least with EU long-maturity loans or accounting relief – without turning to American arms and equipment as a means of plugging festering capabilities gaps. That makes the hurdle higher from the onset.
Political follow-through naturally trumps the building up the European industrial base in importance, as time and consistent work orders will be necessary to ensure humming production lines and innovative military technological research and breakthroughs.
At the end of day, ultimately it will fall on European leadership to remain unified and stalwart in taking over the bulk of conventional military deterrence for Europe. The task is certainly not insurmountable. But it may take longer than five years, and it will unquestionably require a sea-change in European attitudes about defense and the need for strong militaries. Without the latter everything else becomes academic.
Dan Darling is Forecast International’s director of military and defense markets. In this role, Dan oversees a team of analysts tasked with covering everything from budgeting to weapons systems to defense electronics and military aerospace. Additionally, for over 17 years Dan has, at various times, authored the International Military Markets reports for Europe, Eurasia, the Middle East and the Asia-Pacific region.
Dan's work has been cited in Defense News, Real Clear Defense, Asian Military Review, Al Jazeera, and Financial Express, among others, and he has also contributed commentary to The Diplomat, The National Interest and World Politics Review. He has been quoted in Arabian Business, the Financial Times, Flight International, The New York Times, Bloomberg and National Defense Magazine.
In addition, Dan has made guest appearances on the online radio show Midrats and on The Media Line, as well as The Red Line Podcast, plus media appearances on France 24 and World Is One News (WION).
