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).