Juncker calls for the creation of an EU army.

[Danthus]

http://www.theguardian.com/world/20...calls-for-eu-army-european-commission-miltary

The European Union needs its own army to help address the problem that it is not “taken entirely seriously” as an international force, the president of the European commission has said.

Jean-Claude Juncker said such a move would help the EU to persuade Russia that it was serious about defending its values in the face of the threat posed by Moscow.

However, his proposal was immediately rejected by the British government, which said that there was “no prospect” of the UK agreeing to the creation of an EU army.

“You would not create a European army to use it immediately,” Juncker told the Welt am Sonntag newspaper in Germany in an interview published on Sunday.

“But a common army among the Europeans would convey to Russia that we are serious about defending the values of the European Union.”

Juncker, who has been a longstanding advocate of an EU army, said getting member states to combine militarily would make spending more efficient and would encourage further European integration.

“Such an army would help us design a common foreign and security policy,” the former prime minister of Luxembourg said.

“Europe’s image has suffered dramatically and also in terms of foreign policy, we don’t seem to be taken entirely seriously.”

Juncker also said he did not want a new force to challenge the role of Nato. In Germany some political figures expressed support for Juncker’s idea, but in Britain the government insisted that the idea was unacceptable.

How would this work given we have NATO and that the likes of the UK, Germany and France are big contributors to it.

Would the EU army come under their control?

What happens if NATO want to take action somewhere but the EU doesn't want this new army to be involved.

It seems like an utterly barmy idea to me.

 

[Danthus]

Scrap national borders and sovereignty, just become a country called "europe". Single currency, single set of borders, single government.



Seems like a great idea to me. Progression towards a one world government.

I take it you support one EU state then?

 

[Danthus]

Of course you can, even starting at just 0.5% of EU gdp, gives you roughly $100billion to spend. More than enough to start a sizable force. Especially as it would be integrated and wouldn't overlap as every country does what it wants.

That For size would be the third biggest force in the world, after USA and china. And $10bn more than Russia spends.
That's what collectively doing things does. So much more efficient and so much more money. Over the years raise that to 1% and you would dwarf even Chinas spending.

We both no full well that £100billion would come from additional funding, not out of any existing budget.

 

[Danthus]

Of course it would be additional funding for the EU, it would be up to the individual countries how they raise it.

I would expect most countries would reduce their own military.

And we all know where the majority of that funding would come from.

Would Greece be asked to put more into the pot?

 

[Danthus]

YEs every country would pay 0.5%, they've agreed to. Although most don't spend 2% on defence.
Greece is actual one of the few countries that has actually kept to that commitment and spend just over 2% on defence, so it wouldn't be an issue for them.

Have you actually paid any attention as to what is happening in Greece lately?

 

[Danthus]

Or drop something, like cut defence from 2.4% down to 1.9% and give the 0.5% to EU, if which we would get a much better defence out if that 0.5% than the 1.9% of internal spending.

So stop funding our own forces in order to fund an army we may not be able to call upon if the EU decides we can't?

Great plan.

 

[Danthus]

If we just want another agreement on co-operation between existing forces, well that might work but then again might be rather redundant and could already be handled under existing structures such as NATO.

If we're actually talking about creating a new organisation and reducing national militaries in order to contribute to it then I really don't see that working too well at the moment. Certianly not for the UK - not all our interests are aligned for a start, we'd need to give up foreign policy to the EU really, otherwise you have some similar issues as the ECB/Euro where countries with different needs, making varied decisions on taxation/spending/debt etc... don't have control of their interest rates.

Bingo, at lest someone other than me has realised this.

A single federal EU superstate is what these faceless EU bureaucrats are aiming force.

 

[Danthus]

French and uk dint work together, it isn't an integrated unified force etc. The small countries wouldn't be leeching it. It would be an EU force with more spending than Russia. That's the whole point. You get far more for your money when you join together, than you do when it's all broken out, overlapping capabilities.

So we have an EU army.

Can the UK call on it for its own use if it so wishes?

Lets say Russia park on the border of Poland, can Poland send in the EU army to fight Russia or would that need EU approval.

After all both are paying in, who decides and when and where it can be called upon?

 

[Danthus]

EU decides on EU army, obviously. But it would send in the forces to defend EU territory.

Cutting our forces by 0.5% we would still have a sizable home forces.
A country pays in and that's that, you don't control it, you dont have a say, other than your representatives in the EU parliament.

What if the UK or Germany wants to veto the use of the EU army?

 

[Danthus]

They wouldn't be able to. It's. It there army, it's the EUs. No different to UK parliament signing off in war.
That is the entire point of having an EU army, no country owns them, no country supplies them. It's EU equipment, soldiers apply and are trained by the EU into EU forces.

The soldiers would be British, French and German etc etc.

The idea that the elected heads of those three countries have no say in how those soldiers are used is laughable.

 

[Danthus]

Nationality would be, but they would be EU soldiers. Britain etc would have no control over them.

Wow.