Shame, grief, rage—and fear
Stop wittering, start working. Here's my plan—a new defence bank for Europe
We are in a defence emergency and a catastrophe is looming.
The big point: Trump has taken the pressure off Russia. The American president likes and trusts Putin. He wants Russia back in the G7. Ukraine and Europe’s security are mere details.
That’s terrible news for Ukraine now, for Europe soon, and for the United States eventually.
We should be ashamed that we failed to support Ukraine when we could. We should grieve for the Ukrainians’ sacrifice, which we squandered. We should be furious at our decision-makers for getting us into this mess. And we should be afraid of what awaits us.
But we should not be surprised. As I argued in the Times last month, the US has always been a difficult ally. But the alternative is worse. And we shouldn’t blame the US for our own mistakes and wishful thinking.
Don’t forget. Russia’s war in Ukraine is not about territory. It’s about challenging a security system that does not give Russia the imperial role it regards as fore-ordained. Putin’s gamble paid off, because he has won the battle of wills. We got bored, tired and scared. Our unity splintered. He can keep going. We can’t.
“Putin won’t stop in Ukraine,” we said. Well, it’s clear we haven’t stopped him. And so he won’t stop. He’s shown that nuclear blackmail works. We didn’t give Ukraine the weapons it needed to win, at a time when it could have won.
Now we will reap the harvest of our cowardice and complacency.
The immediate question is the fix. It’s just possible that the Trump administration, buoyed by interest in Ukraine’s mineral riches and the fear of looking weak, drives a hard bargain (eg EU membership still open, no formal territorial concessions, no “denazification”); and then provides military back-up for a ceasefire. That would be a mixture of high-tech support for a European intervention force, and “porcupine” long-range weapons to give Ukraine a deterrent, even when its battered army starts going home.
But that’s not likely. First, because Trump chiefly cares about the headline “Trump brokers peace deal,” not what comes in the paragraphs below.
Second, nobody’s willing to provide the 500,000-strong military force needed to make Ukraine truly secure. The danger is that a handful of European states reluctantly deploy a trip-wire force that lacks credibility, yet claims it. This UKRFOR will be a sitting duck for Russian attacks. It will also reduce our already flimsy defence of the frontline states.
This will further erode Europe’s deterrent. I can just imagine the statements of “grave concern” as Russia continues sabotage, cyber-attacks, mysterious drone strikes and other provocations, in Ukraine and in Nato countries.
We are also reaping the harvest of stinginess: decades when we outsourced our defence to the United States. Admirable European leaders like Kaja Kallas can decry “appeasement”. (That’s actually unfair—appeasement was a mistake, but it had a rationale). But Europe is in no position to stand up to the United States. We need them. And they don’t think they need us.
(There’s the trade war too, but that’s a detail compared with the disaster on security).
Europeans mostly sit around bemoaning all this. Instead, they should be jumping into action. We need to make big economic sacrifices—higher taxes, shorter holidays, skinnier public services—and take bigger risks. We must
rebuild stockpiles of munitions and spare parts;
boost logistics and other “enablers”;
lessen our dependence on American high-tech weapons, which may not work when we need them; and
rethink our nuclear deterrence.
I’m working on the first of these. Together with Guy de Selliers (who helped set up the EBRD) and General Sir Nick Carter, former chief of the UK defence staff, I’m pushing for a new defence bank.
The aim is to raise £100 billion (or more) for European defence. I outlined it in the Times this week. It’s gained formal backing from the Polish government, with encouraging reactions in France and elsewhere.
Key points
Use €10bn up-front state finance to borrow €90bn (or more) in private capital.
Long-term loans, better procurement, greater capacity.
Hardware first.
Boost growth, manufacturing and skills base in line with Draghi plan.
Led and founded by a core group of like-minded European NATO members—so veto-proof.
Complements EIB defence mandate.
A profit-making but not profit-maximising bank.
Loans should be excluded from the EU’s rules on debts and deficits.
Time-limited, winding down once the job is done.
Act fast: political decision by June.
Anyone who wants a copy of the full draft concept paper should ping me.
Remember: we are rich enough to fix this. We just don’t want to.
Also:
What I’ve been writing
— I went to the Oslo Security Conference, and wrote a piece urging Norway to dump its long-held predictability fetish, and to hold a JEF ministerial on Svalbard.
— I highlighted allies’ fears that US-made high-tech weapons won’t work in a war with Russia if Donald Trump doesn’t want to confront Putin.
— Also for CEPA, I looked at the latest sabotage in the Baltic Sea, which I reprised in the Times.
What I’ve been reading
Same River Twice by Sofi Oksanen. The Finnish-Estonian writer is known for her fiction but she's a fine polemicist too. This is about Soviet and now Russian use of sexual violence. Don't read it at bedtime.
Indulging Kleptocracy: British Service Providers, Postcommunist Elites, and the Enabling of Corruption, by John Heathershaw, Tena Prelec, and Tom Mayne. The veteran anti-corruption experts try to explain the mindset and system that sells "indulgences" to the worst people in the world.
Russia starts here: Real Lives in the Ruins of Empire by Howard Amos. A haunting and insightful look at the Pskov region. My review will be in the Times later this month.
Best regards, Edward