Tony Blair can rightly feel a sense of satisfaction that he has come through that most difficult test of leadership - war - with flying colours. He was resolute when other NATO leaders seemed to waiver, and he led from the front. If Kosovo had gone wrong, the political consequences would have been all the more severe for him, given that he had made clear that this was a war of principle for him. His sense of satisfaction will be tempered by the enormous effort that was needed to keep the NATO allies pointing in the same direction. He may have taken away a number of lessons. First must be the limitations of the European nations, either collectively or individually, to determine policy. NATOmay be officially a consensus organisation, but it has an implicit qualified majority voting system, where the size of military contribution determines voting weight. Whether it is grand strategy (the threat of the use of ground forces), tactical planning (targeting policy) or operational constraints (dropping bombs from 15000 feet altitude), the US calls the shots. With over half the air campaign sorties provided by the US, and a higher proportion of the bombs dropped, the US policy predominance is scarcely surprising. Nor would it matter too much if there was clear leadership in a war situation, which gave confidence to the rest of NATO that the operation was being managed to produce the desired result as efficiently as possible. The checks and balances of the US Constitution, coupled with a damaged lame duck President, made this impossible.
Kosovo was not the first time the Tony Blair had discovered the limitations of UK influence in security matters. The Iraq crisis during the British Presidency of the EU should have been a good opportunity for him to orchestrate a coherent European response. After limited discussion, this looked impossible, and the UK sent an aircraft carrier to join the US forces in the Gulf. The rest of Europe noted sadly that, even with a New Labour government, Britain's first loyalty remained to the US. Yet this loyalty, even with the extra dimension of the Blair-Clinton relationship, did not allow the Prime Minister to gain support in the USA for his more aggressive Kosovo strategy as articulated during the Washington Summit. All of this must have convinced Tony Blair that he must continue to push for a better European Defence Capability. The extraordinary U-turn by the UK at St Malo in early December last year signalled the start of a new enthusiasm for European defence. The St Malo declaration opens with :"The European Union needs to be in a position to play its full role on the international stage". It goes on to say:"To this end, the Union must have the capacity for autonomous action backed up by credible military forces, the means to decide to use them, and a readiness to do so, in order to respond to international crises." This is a very new policy for the UK.
The NATO Strategic Concept agreed at the Washington Summit in April acknowledges this new mood of co-operation in defence in Europe and is reasonably supportive of the development. The EU summit in Cologne at the beginning of June was an opportunity to take the work further forward, but inevitably Kosovo overshadowed all discussion. Nevertheless, the first incumbent of the new post of High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy was announced. It is to be Javier Solana, the current Secretary General of NATO. He is an interesting choice: a likeable politician with great skills at achieving consensus, and a deep knowledge of NATO and its politics. He is a good choice in terms of reassuring the US and maintaining NATO. Only time will tell whether he is able to carve out the necessary turf in the EU to bring some coherence to its security planning. Already it is clear that their are different visions for the future. Tony Blair made it clear in a speech to the RUSI at the end of March that he did not have in mind defence forces operated by the EU Commissioners or by the European Parliament. On the other hand, the President- designate of the Commission and close friend of Tony Blair, Romano Prodi, and his fellow Italian Commissioner Emma Bonino have indicated their support for the development of a European Army.
There is little sign of adventurous thinking in the Ministry of Defence in Whitehall yet. The sentiment about European Defence may be different, but there is a striking lack of concrete proposals beyond advice for other European nations to follow the UK lead in restructuring their forces. The panic in government following the recent European elections will not make it any easier to move towards more integrated European defence arrangements. The discussion remains mainly at the institutional level where diplomats can enjoy the cut and thrust of debate without actually improving capability one iota.
If the UK government is serious about getting better value from Europe's enormous expenditure on defence, it needs to look at opportunities for pooling national resources in the short term, and establishing a European defence planning and budgetary system in the longer term. Early opportunities for pooling capability are possible for the Eurofighter, for air transport, for air-to-air refuelling aircraft, for helicopters, for naval mine counter-measures, for frigates, for medical services, for communications and for army engineers. In the medium term, there would be much to be said for setting up common logistic support arrangements and developing a European aircraft carrier group of say 5 ships. Only in the long term can we conceive of a European army. The EU itself will have to develop much more both in terms of integration but also in democratic accountability. We do not however need to wait for that before we establish a European defence budget to support the pooled activities. This is the only way to reverse the decline in national defence budgets and the inefficiencies of running tiny front line forces. European nations have been happy to operate a supranational AWACs force, and to depend on the US for military satellite provision. Why then should they balk at gaining more capability by pooling some of their military resources?