After the Minister of the Armed Forces, Florence Parly, it was the turn of General Lecointre, Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces, advocate for a Europe with real strategic and technological autonomy. Both believe that, if the United States remains a very close ally of France and Europe, the trajectory taken no longer allows the defense of the country and the continent to be based on the basis of marked dependence. towards Washington. Furthermore, both believe that the current phenomenon across the Atlantic is not the only result of the particular character of President Trump, but rather a deeper and therefore more lasting movement.
This strategic independence is expressed by Franco-German programs such as the SCAF (Future Air Combat System) or the MGCS (Main Ground Combat System), respectively the new generation combat aircraft and combat tank. However, can we imagine that real strategic independence would emerge in Europe, without the Europe of Defense, in the political and military sense, being effective?
Because since the end of the Second World War, the greatest European weakness has been the lack of cohesion in the face of the United States of the European states themselves. Therefore, can we envisage creating technological dependence on another European state, which can be constrained by the United States which ensures its security, within NATO? Can we today imagine creating technological dependence on Poland, Romania, or even the Netherlands, knowing to what extent these countries are exposed to American defense industries for their own defense?
In fact, strategic autonomy can only be the consequence of a process of global integration of the defense policies and means of European countries, or of part of them, in order to create a coherent, sufficient and autonomous. Without renouncing the alliance with the United States, this European alliance will be able, by its nature, to create a context of trust allowing the implementation of true strategic interdependence.
