EU establishes military headquarters
By
Johannes Stern
10 March 2017
In the run-up to this week’s Euro summit, EU foreign and defence ministers agreed to set up a joint command centre for military operations. The move is part of a plan by the EU to develop a foreign and security policy independent of NATO and the United States.
The headquarters is expected to begin operations in March and be fully operational in June. The training of EU armed forces in Mali, Somalia and Central Africa will then begin under the control of the new planning and leadership centre. In the medium term, the headquarters will also oversee “executive” EU military deployments—i.e., comprehensive war operations, such as in Syria or Iraq, which up to now have been led by headquarters in the respective EU member states.
Officially, the European Union designates the new command centre as “military planning and leadership capabilities” rather than as a “military headquarters.” According to Der Spiegel this is due to “the resistance against the construction of a European army in the still current EU member Great Britain, as well as other capital cities, which primarily rely on NATO or, like Austria, are neutral.”
But this is precisely the point of the new centre—the gradual creation of a European army dominated by Germany, which can wage war independently of NATO.
The new command centre is a “great step towards a common defence and security policy,” said German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel (SPD), while Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen (CDU) applauded a step “that has been tried and failed for many years.” European security and defence policy had been put to one side for too long. Now, however, the EU was “on the right path.”
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