Opinion

71% want an EU army. Kallas has said no.

Seventy-one per cent of the public backs it and billions in joint defence money are already moving, so the doubters are behind the facts. The next summit should put a European command on the agenda and tie the cash to it.

The European Union has started paying for defence as if it meant it. The SAFE programme has already sent almost €13.5 billion to eleven member states, and a second round worth up to €21.3 billion is waiting. The Commission's Readiness 2030 plan mobilises up to €800 billion. And a new GLOBSEC survey of 13,730 people in fourteen countries says what you may already feel: 71% of Europeans want the EU to have its own army. The money moves, the public votes yes, and the only thing missing is a command to tie it together.

One voice at the top is holding it up: the EU's top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, rejected the idea of an EU army in April. The sceptics make a practical case. In February, Guntram Wolff of Bruegel said a sovereign European army was quite unlikely unless circumstances changed dramatically, and Max Bergmann of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies put the stumbling block plainly: European militaries are not designed to work with each other but with the United States, so any European war effort would be, in his word, very messy. Both were right about what exists. You do not keep a broken tool because the new one is hard to build. And the circumstances Wolff wanted have already changed: in April, Defence Commissioner Andrius Kubilius said Europeans want Europe much stronger in defence and want to see some kind of real military force, understanding that just a combination of 27 armies cannot bring that value.

The wanting is settled. What comes next is the command to build.

Think about what changes for someone starting out in this field now. The alternative is the decade we have had, waiting to hear who in Washington will lead Europe's defence. That decade is already priced in: at The Hague, NATO members pledged 5% of GDP, and Spain capped its budget at just over 2%. Only 34% of Europeans believe their country is prepared for a major security crisis or war. The person starting a career in defence now deserves a job that builds a European force, not a waiting room.

The demand that matches the money already moving is this: the European Council and the Commission should put a European command structure, built alongside NATO, on the agenda of the next summit, and make the second SAFE round, the €21.3 billion not yet paid out, conditional on joining it, so the status quo costs more than the step. The sceptics have already made the practical case; the answer is the cash governments have already voted for, with a condition attached. In April, Kubilius flew to Washington for talks at the Pentagon, and he said the message from the public is one he hopes EU leaders will take into account. Write to your minister. Your MEP gets one too. Ask them when the command goes on the agenda.