The case against a European army

The end of the Cold War was used by the victors to unite Germany. To balance this, Europhiles created a single currency which, by replacing the deutschmark, would ‘hold Germany down’. The reverse occurred. The euro made Germany the most important power in the European Union, and so it remains. Today, the same Europhiles want to use the rebirth of the Cold War to encourage Germany to re-arm. To balance this, they want to create a truly ‘European’ defence, of which Germany would be a vital part. The EU would prevent Germany from using its force for national needs. For this purpose, they say, Nato would be no good because it is intergovernmental. This too seems a recipe for trouble, because the Nato alliance and a genuinely centralised European armed forces could not co-exist. Inside such a European defence arrangement, there would a struggle for mastery between Germany and France, producing disunited command. I know Putin hates the EU, but its latest dream, if it came true, would give him a massive advantage in any future wars he might wish to prosecute.

In the Sunday Times, Professor Lawrence Freedman, analysing the Ukrainian situation, writes: ‘It is foolish to set as a war aim one you cannot be sure of achieving.’ Really? Surely the nature of war makes this impossible. ‘I have set my life upon a cast,’ says Richard III, ‘And I will stand the hazard of the die.’ Sir Lawrence is the official historian of the Falklands war, so he must know that no one could be sure of achieving Britain’s war aim of recapturing the islands. What is true is that thinking you can be sure of achieving your aim is a bad idea: look at Argentina in 1982, or Vladimir Putin in his attempt to decapitate the Kyiv regime in 72 hours.