Defence : From Strategic Dependence to European Military Autonomy ?

THE DEBATE on Europe’s dependence on the United States (US) often begins with defence spending. This is misleading. European allies collectively spend well over €400 billion annually on defence and have announced substantial increases since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The central issue is not primarily one of defence expenditure, even if the US president insists it is, but of military dependence. Europeans continue to rely on the US for the capabilities that enable modern joint operations, the industrial capacity needed to sustain prolonged conflict and much of the command architecture that underpins collective defence in Europe. This dependency is being questioned in a context where the US is actively handing primary responsibility for conventional defence to Europe. This comes in a context where the US administration has, in the recent past, threatened to seize Greenland and is assessing how far to reduce its military forces in Europe.

Clearly, transatlantic trust is at an all-time low, and Europeans are questioning the unquestioning faith they had in the US in the past. Europeans remained steadfast in their opposition to the US war on Iran in 2026, but this only led to the accusation that Europeans were unreliable allies, not least because many allies denied the US the use of the airspace needed to conduct bombing runs on Iran. And in the case of the subsequent closure of the Strait of Hormuz, we see Europeans nevertheless bearing the brunt of energy costs and energy supply gluts because of US military action that Europe wants no part of, even if many European governments have underlined their opposition to the regime in Iran. Nevertheless, Europeans appear to be at the receiving end of decisions that they had no part in formulating.