EU defense needs 'big bang' - Kubilius

VILNIUS - The European Union's defense needs a "big bang", the bloc's Defense and Space Commissioner Andrius Kubilius says as the US turns away from ensuring Europe's security and Russia increasingly threatens it.

"EU defense needs a 'big bang' as we can no longer achieve what we need through this step-by-step improvement of the situation," he said on Thursday as he took part in a debate on the EU White Paper on the future of European defense at the Lithuanian Parliament.

RESPONSIBILITY FOR OWN DEFENSE

According to Kubilius, the basis for the EU's work today is the old wisdom that if you want peace, you must prepare for war.

"Russia produces more weapons in three months than all NATO countries, including the US, produce in a year," Kubilius pointed out.

This year, he said, Russia vows to spend more on war this year, in purchasing power parity terms, than all EU countries combined will spend on defense.

The changing priorities of the United States must also be taken into account, he said.

"We are all well aware that the US, for all our emotions and explanations among ourselves, will be increasingly focused on China's rising power and will have to devote more and more of its security resources to it. Naturally, we have to plan for an evolutionary decline in America's involvement in our security for such reasons," Kubilius said. "This is why we need to shift the responsibility for our defense onto our own shoulders."

"450 million Europeans should not be annoyed or angry that 340 million Americans, with their own agenda and their own challenges, will not always be able to help us to defend ourselves against Russia with a population of 140 million, which has failed to overcome Ukraine with 28 million inhabitants over the past three years," he said.

COMMISSION PROPOSALS

According to Kubilius, the European Commission already has a preparedness strategy for the period of up to 2030.

The NATO summit in June is expected to endorse new EU capability targets, which will serve as a basis for the European Commission to plan the way forward in helping member states to meet those targets, the commissioner said, adding that the EU's plans to strengthen its military capabilities are in no way in competition with NATO's plans.

Kubilius also pointed out that the White Paper includes the defense of Ukraine as an integral part of the defense of Europe as it foresees the purchase of more weapons from Ukraine and the provision of these weapons to the Ukrainian army as aid.

Referring to the practical steps taken by the European Commission, Kubilius said that the drafted SAFE program regulation will allow providing 150 billion euros in soft loans to member states.

There are also plans to allow member states to exclude 1.5 percent of their GDP spent on defense from their budget deficits.

UKRAINE AS AN EXAMPLE

Europe must significantly increase the size of its military industry, Kubilius underlined, pointing to Ukraine as an example of how this can be done in a relatively short period of time.

In his words, Ukraine's defense industry has grown 35-fold in the last three years, and the weapons it produces are of good quality and are much cheaper.

"If EU countries were to take part in a war like the one in Ukraine, our resources would not be able to withstand very long, with what we have accumulated," Kubilius said as he stressed the need to find ways to significantly increase the mass production of conventional weapons such as artillery, drones, missiles etc.

According to the commissioner, the White Paper also includes plans to strengthen the capabilities of strategic enablers - such as space intelligence, airlift of heavy cargo, aerial refueling and other things that are important for the military.

"We are very, very dependent on our transatlantic partners in this area and we need to step up our game in this area," he said.

There are also plans to develop defense projects of common European interest, such as an air defense shield, a cyber defense shield and a space defense shield.

Europe is stepping up its defense in the wake of Russia's war in Ukraine, launched in February 2022, and as US President Donald Trump wants Europe's greater contribution to its own defense.

Published by the European Commission last week, the White Paper provides solutions to address critical capability gaps and build a strong industrial base for defense, suggests ways for member states to invest more in defense, procure defense systems and increase the readiness of Europe's defense industry in the long term.