Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-06-18-Speech-3-084"
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"en.20030618.7.3-084"2
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"Mr President, the debate on a joint European security strategy, which was proposed at Rhodes, and whose end-result is to be a strategy on the agenda at Thessaloniki, is very ambitious, but I detect a certain scepticism in Mr Solana’s remarks, as well as in yours, Mr Patten. It will not be the first strategy, or first draft of a strategy, to be presented, and it will certainly not be the last. Unlike Mr Cohn-Bendit, I take the view that the weak point of this strategy is in fact the point in time at which it is being presented. The impression is given that it is a counter-strategy in response to the USA. The European Union and its security strategy would, I think, have been important enough, without being made to be that sort of initiative.
What is true is that the scenario in which we are now living is a new one, characterised by insecurity brought on by regional crisis situations making themselves manifest in international terrorist networks and acts of terrorism, to which they are also exposed. It is also true, though, that the USA and the EU take a different view of this threat, and respond to it in different ways. The USA sees itself as being at war with international terrorism and claim that this entitles them to launch pre-emptive strikes. That is what they did in Afghanistan and in Iraq, putting their trust in their military strength, which nothing in the European Union can match.
The European presence and the definition of its tasks are quite different under such circumstances. Up to now, Europeans have been neither able nor willing to open up military fronts in dealing with international threats. I therefore regard their involvement in crisis situations – whether in Afghanistan, from which I returned only yesterday, or in the Congo, as is now being planned – as something to be honoured, but too symbolic and too inconsistent. Simply showing the flag is far from enough. Important though they may be, presences of this sort therefore expose themselves to security risks that are hard to calculate and often call forth expectations that we cannot fulfil.
For as long as the Member States of the European Union are not prepared to top up their defence budgets too and make the necessary funds and manpower available, all these doctrines and strategies will seem like empty forms of words. In view of the opposing views within the EU, the attempt at a common strategy seems more like an attempt at concealing differences of opinion rather than removing them, and that is something of which we should beware. The devising of strategies and the creation of joint roles such as that of a European Foreign Minister – which I essentially welcome – do nothing to make up for the lack of the political will to give life to a common European policy and security strategy. The problem of a dualism between the USA and the European Union, and of their mutual alienation, can only adversely affect the quest for a common European security strategy."@en1
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