Italy calls for creation of 'European army'

According to RT, Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani recently called on EU leaders to create a common European army. Mr. Tajani argued that without a common army, the bloc cannot have a credible foreign policy.

“If we want to be peacemakers in the world, we need a European army,” Mr. Tajani told Italy's La Stampa newspaper on January 7.

“This is a fundamental prerequisite for an effective European foreign policy,” he said, adding that in a world of “powerful actors” such as the United States, Russia and China, European citizens “can only be protected by what already exists, and it is called the European Union.”

Some 22 EU countries are currently members of NATO, and the US-led pact has effectively defined security policy on the continent since the start of the Cold War. However, some EU leaders have floated the idea of ​​pooling their militaries into a joint force independent of US control in recent years.

French President Emmanuel Macron and former German Chancellor Angela Merkel are two of the most vocal proponents of the idea. Macron famously called NATO “brain dead” in 2019, and has called on European leaders to pursue “strategic autonomy” from Washington.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg warned in 2021 that such a move would “undermine the bond between North America and Europe.” When talk of an independent European army first arose two decades ago, then-US Defense Secretary William Cohen was more blunt, calling the idea “a threat to the very existence of NATO.”

The conflict in Ukraine has clearly put a damper on the discussion of European autonomy. Macron has since changed his stance on NATO and now supports expanding the US-led alliance. Merkel’s replacement, Olaf Scholz, still speaks of the need for “a more sovereign European Union,” but has been silent on the idea of ​​building what Merkel calls “a real, genuine European army.”

NATO’s eastern European members, meanwhile, have been the most enthusiastic supporters of American oversight of security in Europe. After Poland received a $2 billion loan from Washington to modernize its military and welcomed the first permanent U.S. military garrison to its base in Poznan, then-Defense Minister Mariusz Blaszczak said in November that “any competition between NATO and the EU in terms of security is a very bad thing,” and that Warsaw had chosen a close partnership with the United States over “some imaginary European army.”

After all, the EU adopted a common defence strategy last year, paving the way for a 5,000-strong “rapid deployment” force – still a long way from a so-called common army.

Hoang Bach