The new EU cooperation program should lead to increased investment in security and defense.

After seven long years of hibernation, the European Union's Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) was launched last December 11, mission statement to achieve greater convergence in security and defense matters. The initiative represents a leap forward in the process of European integration, overcoming the stage of stagnation and doubts brought about by the last economic and financial crisis.

▲Soldiers carrying the flag of the European Union in front of the EU institutions, in 2014 [European Parliament].

article / Manuel Lamela Gallego

The same year in which the 60th anniversary of the Treaties of Rome was commemorated ended with a certain sense of vindication and reaffirmation on the part of the European Union and its Member States, having succeeded against all odds in generating investment and cooperation in the areas of security and defense. The implementation of the Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) is the answer to the urgent need for investment in these two areas, a need that the EU has had for decades and that not even the failure in the Balkans managed to address.

We speak of reaffirmation in the face of the evident crisis that the European Union has suffered in recent years, in which it has seen how doubts have arisen about its own continuity. Despite this delicate situation status, the EU has acted with admirable flexibility and has considered its own role on the world stage with the aim of continuing to make a positive difference in the world goal . It is in this context of reflection and change that we should frame the launch of PESCO.

To this recent loss of credibility must be added the collection of "failures" that the EU has accumulated when it comes to generating a common defense strategy. The words of Javier Solana in 2003 when he acknowledged the failure and fracture of the Union in the Iraq crisis management generated a shadow of impotence and ineptitude that the EU has not been able to shake off so far. The application of PESCO is a great flash of light in the European action towards the exterior, since it shows the unity within the European project in such a delicate area as security and defense.   

In this way, and in compliance with the provisions of the Lisbon Treaty, on November 13 and after several months of insistence by the European committee , 23 Member States signed a notification that represents the first step towards the implementation of the Permanent Structured Cooperation. This moment was declared "historic" by the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Federica Mogherini. This is undoubtedly a turning point in the history of the European Union, since after several decades it has managed to break with the trend that reduced European cooperation to the field of economic integration. PESCO aspires to lay the foundations from which, with truly binding projects, common and shared strategies can be generated that will gradually shape the new Europe of security and defense. In its measure, Permanent Structured Cooperation is positioned like the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) Commission, whose decision-making dimension was one of the pillars for the expansion of European supranationalism into other, more ambitious areas.      

Legal basis

The legal basis for PESCO is found in Articles 42(6) and 46, together with protocol issue 10, of the Lisbon Treaty (2009).

article 42(6): "Member States which meet higher military capability criteria and which have entered into more binding commitments on subject to perform the most demanding tasks shall establish permanent structured cooperation on framework of the Union. This cooperation shall be governed by article 46 and shall not affect the provisions of article 43."

If anything should be emphasized about the Permanent Structured Cooperation, it is its binding nature, whereby States will be truly bound by their commitments, as we can observe in article 46(4): "If a participating Member State no longer meets the criteria or can no longer assume the commitments referred to in Articles 1 and 2 of protocol on permanent structured cooperation, the committee may adopt a decision suspending the participation of that State".

PESCO's lack of influence over state sovereignty is one of its fundamental characteristics. This is clearly reflected in Articles 46(5) and 46(6) of the Lisbon Treaty. The first clarifies the steps to be taken by a Member State to leave project: it need only notify committee of its intention to leave withdrawal. The second deals with decision-making within the Permanent Structured Cooperation: decisions will be taken unanimously, in a unanimity constituted by the votes of the representatives of all the Member States participating in PESCO.

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On December 11, the European committee finally decided to launch PESCO, an initiative joined by Ireland and Portugal, bringing the issue membership to 25 countries. This resulted in the adoption of the first 17 projects on which the participating states are committed to cooperate and which will be formally adopted by committee in 2018. These projects will cover various areas within European security and defense, such as the training of troops or the standardization and facilitation of cross-border military transport (the latter has been in high demand by NATO in recent years). Apart from this list of projects, it is worth mentioning the commitment of the States to steadily and continuously increase defense budgets in real terms. After several years of economic and financial recession in most European states, defense spending falls short of the 2% of GDP agreed at the NATO summit in Wales in 2014. This is undoubtedly one of the most important tasks that PESCO has to fulfill in order to continue with a stable development .

The Permanent Structured Cooperation initiative was taken by France, Germany, Spain and Italy, which confirms the functioning of the two-speed Europe, although in the end project has been joined by practically the entire Union, with the only absences being Malta, Denmark (which does not participate in European defense) and obviously the United Kingdom, which is planning to leave in March 2019. It remains to be seen whether this high participation does not jeopardize the initial ambition of project. Although the very nature of PESCO facilitates the coexistence of the two Europes as long as the minimum commitments are met.

The friction that PESCO and NATO may have or the future position that the United Kingdom will hold in European defense after its exit from the EU are other questions that PESCO raises. Only its implementation will dispel these uncertainties. Leaving these doubts aside for a moment, what can be affirmed is that Permanent Structured Cooperation opens up a wide horizon and that it is exclusively in the hands of European citizens to take advantage of it.

As the current French Minister of Economics and Finance, Bruno le Maire, says: "Europe is not a certainty, it is a fight".

Bibliography

Council of the EU. (11 December 2017). consilium.europa.eu. Retrieved from Cooperation at subject defense: statement press release

Council of the European Union, (2017). Legislative acts and other instruments (PESCO), (p. 20). Brussels.

European Union (2009). Treaty of Lisbon. Lisbon, Portugal.

The Council and the High Representative of foreign affairs and security policy (2017). Notification on Permanent Structured Cooperation, (p. 10).