EU Referendum

It looks a little as if the adolescents may find themselves without parental aid and support sooner than they thought. Not that the Americans are withdrawing from the European commitments they faithfully kept to throughout the Cold War. Deary me, no. They are merely realigning their installations.

According to the Department of Defense press release

With the U.S. European Command’s force structure realignment and transformation, it was determined that RAF West Ruislip and RAF Daws Hill are no longer required.

These will now be returned to the host nation though what it will do with them is anybody’s guess. Perhaps turn them into global warming theme parks.

One would guess that there will be quite a lot of force structure realignment and transformation in Europe in the next few years up to and including a complete disappearance of the force, which will no longer be with us.

It is true that in the teeth of smug opposition, Prime Minister Blair wants Britain to be part of the new Missile Defence System and several of the East European countries have also expressed strong interest, despite the inevitable and rather synthetic Russian anger. But Angela Merkel has been rather busy in her latest round of travels (she still finds it rather hard to stay at home for more than a week or so) trying to get European countries to oppose it.

No Missile Defence System and lots of force structure realignment. Well, it won’t hurt the European countries to realize that choices have to be made. It’s called growing up.

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Labels: anti-Americanism, NATO

Small European nations, such as the three Baltic states, cannot easily sustain the cost of maintaining a dual defence arrangement with Nato and the European Union.

So said Estonian President Toomas Ilves (pictured), at a press conference in Helsinki with Finnish President Tarja Halonen, both leaders agreeing that the best solution for nations like Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania is for the EU to increase collaboration with Nato and establish a joint approach to European defence systems.

This is according to Defense News which has Ilves complaining that, while large European countries might be able to afford a dual system, the smaller ones cannot. Estonia, for instance, is both a Nato member and a nation within the EU. "In defence terms," he says, "this demands we dedicate time and resources to our Nato role and EU defence systems. This is costly for small nations. The vital dimension is that the EU and NATO must collaborate more closely."

This blows apart any claim that the EU defence identity is complementary to Nato, simply providing an alternative political framework for deploying the same military forces in areas where there is no Nato interest.

Hence does the Estonian president complain that it makes no sense for Europe to have two powerful parallel organisations that have "little contact with each other." He believes it would be much better "if small European nations could co-ordinate their defence arrangements with a single European defence organisation, rather than having to budget for two parallel organisations."

"National defence costs are rising at a time when European nations are being called upon to support Nato's international crisis missions and contribute to the EU's rapid response forces," added the Finnish president. "The issue of dual defence arrangements is one that needs to be examined."

This is, of course, precisely the issue to which we have been drawing attention for some time, so it is helpful to get formal acknowledgement that Nato EU members are having to finance what amounts to two separate defence polities.

This has been evident in the British struggle to support the war efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, while also building up the incompatible equipment and structures needed to meet the specifications for the European Rapid Reaction Force.

One area where Ilves is wrong, though, is in believing that large European countries can necessarily afford a dual system. The UK cannot afford huge white elephants like the Eurofighter, and it cannot afford two carrier groups and the Army's FRES programme, and support two wards, all on the current defence budget.

Our government has to admit that this, and – if it is going to maintain its commitments to Iraq and Afghanistan – cut back its support for building a European defence identity. Otherwise, it must put much more money into the defence budget and come clean with the British public, identifying the additional expenditures as part of the price of further European integration.

COMMENT THREAD

Labels: defence, NATO

“Stop the Overstretch in the Armed Forces”, says the headline on the official Conservative website in that rather unappealing green they have taken to using. Dr Fox, Tory spokesman on defence, has been attacking the Labour government for overstretching and underfunding our forces.

So far so good, though he does not seem to have any concrete suggestions as to what the Conservatives might do about this state of affairs but then, it is hard to give definite undertakings or precise figures at this stage of the electoral cycle.

Dr Fox also has a go at NATO allies who do not pull their weight.

He also criticised other NATO governments for not pulling their weight in operations, and called for powers to suspend them if they fail to contribute as promised. Accusing Germany, Italy and Spain of "not fully playing their role" in bolstering Alliance forces in Afghanistan, he said: "We may require more troops but I don't see why that has to be British troops. We are more than shouldering our load."

That is the end of the piece on Conservatives.com and one has to go to the Yorkshire Post to find out what else did the bouncy little lad say.

"Where we have Nato operations taking place, the country that carries out any specific mission is the one that pays for it.

"When I was in Poland and Hungary in the last few weeks, I was complaining to them that they have come into Nato, pocketed the security guarantee and have cut the defence spending.

"We will seek, when we come to Government, to reach an agreement with our Nato partners to be able to suspend Nato members who do not spend the levels of funding that we agreed.

"It is not acceptable that British taxpayers and British armed forces should carry the burden of those who are members of Nato who want the collective security guarantee but are not going to pay for it."

This, dear readers, is known technically as tosh.

First of all, there is no such thing as an agreed level of funding in NATO. We have all seen Jaap De Hoop Scheffer, the SecGen of NATO travel round the capitals with a begging bowl in his hands to increase troop levels here or there, notably Afghanistan.

Secondly, the one country that did respond to the latest appeal for the aforementioned country was Poland, who also has troops in Iraq, as does Hungary. Does Dr Fox not know this? His hosts in those countries must have been superlatively polite not to point certain facts out.

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Labels: Liam Fox, NATO, Poland, Tories