Read more about the article European Commission grants €1.2 billion to 61 Collaborative Defence Cooperation Projects under the European Defence Fund
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European Commission grants €1.2 billion to 61 Collaborative Defence Cooperation Projects under the European Defence Fund

On 20 July 2022, the European Commission announced that it would grant €1.2 billion to 61 collaborative defence research and development (R&D) projects under the European Defence Fund (EDF). The selected projects focus on a broad range of high-end defence capability development, from next-generation aircraft, ships and tanks to artificial intelligence and cyber capabilities, semiconductors and new materials, and quantum and other potentially disruptive technologies.

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29 July 2022
Read more about the article The Rewriting of the EU’s Military Strategy
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The Rewriting of the EU’s Military Strategy

EU countries are bundling their defence forces in a new strategy. Negotiations for these plans began as early as 2020, and they have been tightened up considerably in recent months. This is mainly due to the war in Ukraine. The Strategic Compass now contains ‘tougher language’ against Russia (Barigazzi, Gijs & Lau, 2022). The 47-page final result is inevitably heavily influenced by the recent Russian military invasion of Ukraine and its profound impact on the European security architecture.

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24 May 2022
Read more about the article Is AI the Future of the Military?
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Is AI the Future of the Military?

Over the last seventy years, Artificial Intelligence (AI) has made incredible progress in leaps and bounds. First introduced by John McCarthy during the 1950s, he described AI as the science and engineering of making intelligent machines, especially intelligent computers and programmes studied (McCarthy, 2007). More specifically, he invented the LISP programming language in 1958 using the lambda calculus, which was a major milestone in the development of advanced artificial intelligence applications (Allganize, 2020). Thereafter, AI has expanded its ties in several fields, including the civilian and military sectors. On the one hand, big companies such as Amazon and Google have used these tools to build vast commercial empires based in part on predicting the wants and needs of the people who use them (Gatopoulos, Aljazeera, 2021). On the other hand, the development of AI in the military originated a few decades before and has been more intense and challenging.

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10 November 2021
Read more about the article The EU at the Doorstep of the EU-NATO Joint Declaration : Time to Say Adieu to Berlin Plus
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The EU at the Doorstep of the EU-NATO Joint Declaration : Time to Say Adieu to Berlin Plus

Three years have passed since the EU-NATO Joint Declaration of Brussels in 2018. This troubled period that has seen the stepping down of key institutional leaders in both the EU and US left the West with an underlying feeling of imminent change in the operational relationship between the EU and the Alliance. This feeling can be summarised by European Commission President von Der Leyen in her State of the Union speech in September 2021:

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4 November 2021
Read more about the article EU in Talks to Develop First Entry Force
Belgian soldier during Rampant Lion, EU Battlegroup 2014 II exercise in Grafenwoehr, Germany, Markus Rauchenberger, February 26, 2014 (Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Belgian_soldier_during_Rampant_Lion,_EU_Battlegroup_2014_II_exercise_in_Grafenwoehr,_Germany.jpg)
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EU in Talks to Develop First Entry Force

This year, the EU has faced many unforeseeable threats which have caused member states to reinforce their defence and security policies as well as the EU’s own defence systems. In turn, fourteen countries (Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Germany, Greece, France, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia, and Spain) have joined together to propose a rapid military response team called First Entry Force. This proposal has been debated in the first in-person meeting of the year, by EU defence ministers (“EU moots creation”, 2021). Notably, the military response force would aid in de-escalating or preventing conflict in foreign democratic nations. The military team would also aid in tackling the EU’s gap of capabilities in early action. Indeed, the European Union Global Strategy has claimed that early warning holds no advantage if there is no early action (Shared vision, common action, 2017).

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24 June 2021