Thread by @LScazzieri

After reading and digesting the EU Strategic Compass (SC) here is a thread with my views🧵

I think the SC sets out a realistic vision for EU security policy. It's now up to member-states to live up to their promises @CER_EU

The Strategic Compass (SC) lays out the threats and challenges facing the EU persuasively. It rightly paints a gloomy picture of the security environment, especially after Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

The SC is not a grand strategy. It does not try to spell out how the EU should deal with each challenge. Instead, it focuses on the tools the EU needs to deal with the more threatening strategic environment.

The proposals on capability development are the most concrete and promising, especially waiving VAT on defence, a new bonus system for EDF-funded projects, new financing mechanisms for defence, and possibly increasing the size of the EDF

The impact of these measures depends on whether they are implemented. The need to raise defence spending is even more pressing than ever. But not all EU states will be able or willing to spend more given the deteriorating economy - joint EU investment is more important than ever

Fostering stronger resilience to hybrid threats and cyber will be a major area of focus for the EU. The SC sets out are a range of tools like ‘hybrid rapid response teams’ and a ‘cyber resilience act’. These would consolidate the EU's role in dealing with non-military threats

The SC aims to strengthen the EU’s ability to carry out military ops. The key proposal is a 5000 ‘rapid deployment capacity’ (RDC), ready by 2025. It will be made up of EU Battlegroups, additional forces and will include strategic enablers until now provided by the US.

The components of the RDC would regularly train together in live exercises to increase their readiness and interoperability. The EU also wants to strengthen its HQ, to plan and command larger military operations.

Making the RDC operational by 2025 will be challenging, particularly acquiring the strategic enablers needed. Unclear whether EU states will commit the required forces to the EU HQ and to the RDC force pool as they will face competing demands to allocate personnel to NATO.

Deploying the RDC will still require consensus between the EU states. The Compass talks of “more flexible decision-making”, including constructive abstention and EU-endorsed coalitions of the willing. But these options are not new.

Still, the SC identifies some good ways of strengthening EU ops. The most promising is increasing coordination between CSDP ops and ad-hoc coalitions operating in the same area. Using EU € to pay for exercises would also contribute to greater interoperability and readiness

I found the section on partnerships least concrete, with the exception of the partnership with NATO, Despite talk of “tailored partnerships” there is not much detail on how the EU plans to strengthen bilateral partnerships.

The core of the EU’s partnerships strategy is providing support in training and equipping partners’ military forces. But the SC does not meaningfully engage with the question of how security assistance can be effective, in light of recent Western failures (in AFG, MALI..)

I don’t think the SC will end the debates about the EU’s role in European security. The SC does not in any way pitch the EU as an alternative to NATO. But the EU’s ambitions to be a military player endure and could create EU-US friction and intra-EU tensions

There could be disagreements if the EU expands its investments in defence, as funds would probably be tied to strengthening the EU defence industry and buying EU rather than US kit. This would be particularly controversial under a Trump-like pres

The Compass should facilitate an implicit EU-NATO division of labour. NATO would cover defence, while the EU could use its financial weight for capability development, lead in addressing non-military threats, and stabilise the neighbourhood throughfinancial and military help.

The SC is not a silver bullet. So long as the need for consensus endures, EU actions will reflect the lowest common denominator of what member-states can agree to. Unity could be harder to reach in the future than it was with Russia's invasion ukandeu.ac.uk/the-eus-geopol…

Still, the Compass presents a realistic way forward for EU security policy. If it is fully implemented, the EU will be a stronger security provider, and will be better placed to take on more demanding tasks, including in the military field, if circumstances require it to do so.