I don't support the idea of isolationism. I do support the notion that other nations should carry more of the burden for mutual defense. It's time for Europe in particular to provide for more of their own defense. However, as this article from The Financial Times points out,

It is time to abandon attempts to endow the European Union with a defence policy of its own. Proponents of the idea claim it is necessary to allow Europe to contribute more to the overall western defence effort and to exert some influence over US foreign policy. The paradox is that in choosing the EU as a vehicle through which to further European defence ambitions, they risk failing on both counts.

The latest Franco-German proposals to further the EU's defence ambitions highlight the follies of the project. In effect, Paris has acquiesced to Germany's military ineffectiveness in return for Berlin's acceptance of French institutional obsessions that would disconnect the EU from Nato.



Its supporters have long argued that the so-called European security and defence policy will provide greater legitimacy to calls for increased defence spending in Europe. Certainly such spending is necessary. The capabilities gap between the two sides of the Atlantic has reached a point where the Europeans cannot fight alongside their American allies - even if invited to do so - because their military hardware is too backward. Yet building an EU defence capability is not going to remedy this. The popularity of the Union among its public is about as low as it has ever been - so this is hardly a propitious time to increase spending in its name. Moreover, it is precisely those states - Germany for example, where one would have expected the legitimising force of the EU to be greatest - that are proving most unwilling to raise defence expenditure. In Britain, where spending in order to strengthen the EU is hardly a vote- winner, the military budget has recently risen quite steeply.

Should Europeans acquire the requisite hardware, they will then need adequate structures within which to pursue military co-operation. Here again, the EU seems a curious choice. For one thing, it is hardly an institution that has proved capable of taking important decisions rapidly. Defence is not an area where one can afford to wait 20 years for consensus. Divisions between member states over defence are arguably more profound than in other EU policy areas, given the presence of several neutral countries.

In a world of amorphous and unpredictable security challenges, military operations will increasingly be carried out by "coalitions of the willing" assembled on an ad hoc basis. The EU, however, lacks the necessary flexibility. After years of theological wrangling, it has conspicuously failed to come up with an effective mechanism to enable a small group of member states to act without the others. Moreover, the EU has never been good at involving non-members in its work. The exclusion of Russia and Turkey does not bode well when the most likely area of instability, and hence western intervention, is the Middle East and adjoining regions.

Most important, whatever their pretensions to a greater military capacity, the Europeans will for the foreseeable future depend on US military assistance. Yet the Americans suspect that European defence ambitions are motivated by a desire for competition with the US, not co-operation. French demands for European autonomy in military planning do little to assuage US concerns.

Nato, while far from a perfect organisation, suffers from few if any of the drawbacks that encumber the EU. The alliance by design allows the Europeans to work closely with the Americans. It does not include the neutrals. It manages to avoid decision-making paralysis through US influence and a culture of problem solving. Its secretary-general - currently Lord Robertson - will prove far more effective than EU bureaucrats at cajoling its members into greater defence spending. And Nato is tremendously flexible. Its greatest achievement since the end of the cold war has been its success in blurring the distinction between members and non-members. Some or all of more than 40 states can carry out a mission using Nato command structures.

The most obvious course open to Europeans if they want to wield more military power is to work through Nato. The EU certainly has an important role to play in international affairs but this should not include serious military operations, for which it was simply not designed. This is not a counsel of despair, or an acceptance of US hegemony. On the contrary, with a firm commitment to Nato, European leaders could argue more credibly that the US, too, needs to work within multilateral institutions in pursuit of its international objectives. The EU should abandon its defence policy or its military decline will accelerate.

The writer is director of the European Research Institute at the University of Birmingham