Europe must urgently and quickly be re -equipped to have a “reliable deterrent” mechanism by 2030, the European Commission President said.
In a speech in Copenhagen, the chairman of the committee outlined the four key priorities of the long -awaited White Bible for the European Defense that the Commission will present tomorrow and the need for Europe’s re -equipment by 2030 – a plan that the Commission calls Readiness 2030.
“By 2030, Europe must have a strong European defense attitude. “Ready 2030” means re -equipping and developing our potential to have a reliable deterrence, “said von der Layen.
1. Increase defense spending
The first priority – which is the most important – is the increase in defense spending. “The defense spending of the Member States have increased over 31% by 2021. This is good – but not enough, as it is much lower than the corresponding costs of the US, Russia and China,” said von der Laen.
The Commission presented two weeks ago a plan to mobilize € 800 billion in European defense. This includes a new medium-called “Safe”-which can quickly provide Member States of 150 billion loans. euro for investment in defense.
At the same time, the Commission proposes the activation of the so-called “national escape clause” to give Member States greater flexibility to spend more on defense without violating the budgetary rules that limit the deficit limit to 3% of GDP. This has the ability to mobilize additional defense expenditure up to 1.5% of GDP, or about 650 billion euros in the next four years. At the same time, the Commission is working to derive private funding – either from the EIB or from the capital markets.
2. Large -scale, pan -European cooperation
A second priority is “to buy more European”.
According to von der Laen, “we need to close the gaps of our capabilities in a European way”, by 2030, which means “large -scale, pan -European cooperation” to tackle gaps in priority areas, such as military mobility, airline investments, airline investments, intelligence or quantum computers.
“The cost and complexity of large -scale works far exceed the capacity of every Member State,” the Commission President said, so he stressed that joint supplies should be strengthened.
3. Priority for European Defense Ukraine
The third and “most strategic” priority for European defense is. As the President of the Commission said, “we must make Ukraine strong enough – like a” steel hedgehog ” – to be indigestible to a potential invader.”
The EU has already invested about 50 billion. EUR in military support and has trained more than 73,000 Ukrainian soldiers, while Ukraine’s accession perspective in the EU remains strong.
4. Enhance Europe’s defense industrial base
The fourth priority is to strengthen Europe’s defense industrial base. Today most of the defense investments is going out of Europe and this trend has to change, starting with investment in Europe, von der Layen said.
However, he acknowledged that Europe’s defensive industrial base still has structural weaknesses: it is not yet able to produce defense systems and equipment in the quantities and speeds needed by Member States and remains overly fragmented with dominant national agents supplying domestic markets. According to the Commission, companies need a steady flow of many years of orders to direct their investment. To this end, “we will create a European military sales mechanism,” said von der Lien.
Finally, the President of the Commission said that “we are fully committed to working with the United States. Our safety is indivisible. That is why we are working to open new roads to security with the United Kingdom and other partners in Europe, our neighborhood or within the G7. From Canada to Norway. And as far away as India and other parts of Asia. “
