Toward a Europeanised NATO

Europeanisation is necessary to sustain NATO’s deterrence of Russia at a time when US leadership is agnostic at best and failing at worst. The task is neither impossible, nor quick, nor easy. Europeanisation should be pursued as a matter of urgency.

The post-Cold War transatlantic security cooperation is not dead but entering a new historical phase. Achieving an autonomous European defence will take decades, requiring dialogue with the US to phase in medium and long-term solutions. Greater European defence autonomy naturally implies greater political autonomy in dealing with Russia: the classical NATO approaches between military deterrence and political dialogue will have to be rethought for a new era without American leadership.

Agnostic American leadership and a superior Russian force ratio on the border with NATO calls for a Europeanisation that should be conceived in four areas:

• building conventional fighting power to meet Alliance capability requirements;
• enhancing forward-deployed deterrence to alleviate the eventuality of reinforcement delay;
• building strategic enablers and awareness capabilities for greater autonomy;
• and expanding the French and British nuclear deterrents for a potential European sharing arrangement.

The EU can play a support role, provided that its many defence projects and industrial incentives add value to NATO’s military capability in each of the four areas of Europeanisation. Europe’s and the EU’s best diplomacy is to lead by example and to speak softly and rearm to carry a big stick. Political and industrial fragmentation means that Europe will continue to punch below its weight in defence policy matters, but much can be alleviated by enhanced joint military readiness and, above all, forward-deployed deterrence.

Europe should fill the gaps in all non-collective defence areas: incentivising defence production and market integration, enhancing military mobility, and running all non-Article 5 missions. It should develop autonomous Article 5 responsibilities: command and control, strategic enablers and ISR, as well as EU combat troops and, perhaps, co-financing of a European nuclear deterrent.

Europeanisation is the only way to keep the attention of the US somewhat focused on the continent. Now is the time for building European land power to deny Russian aggression and to show the US that sharing its strategic enablers and ISR remains worthwhile. The tectonic plates of European security are still moving, and the US does not yet appear ready for a complete abandonment.