NO. NEXT QUESTION? Is the EU Anywhere Near Getting Its Own Army?

In truth, EU member states and especially the so-called “big three” – France, Germany and the UK – would have to be fully committed to the project politically. They would also have to strategically reconfigure everything from defence budgets to capabilities to chains of commands to align with the goal of an EU army. There are absolutely no signs of this transpiring in the near future – and not just because the UK has been the traditional foot-dragger.

It is no secret that the UK has been a reluctant champion of the EU’s Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) for some time. Yet for different reasons and in different ways, France and Germany have also been less than willing to invest much more than rhetoric to the D in CSDP of late too, never mind to a full-blown EU army.

France – historically the traditional advocate of European defence – has lost confidence in her EU partners due to their reluctance to commit to EU operations. And although a general promoter of multilateralism, Germany still sidesteps the issue of how and when to use force in response to the threats it identifies.

Let’s assume for a moment that all these issues were settled advantageously, and that an EU army was indeed created. But then try to imagine how effective that force would actually be, micromanaged on virtually everything by bureaucrats in Brussels.