European Centre for Counterterrorism and Intelligence Studies, Germany & aNetherlands – ECCI
EU military mobility plan faces €100bn bill, security risks
Rapporteur ـ Capitals, the Commission and NATO have identified 500 priority projects to move troops across the bloc in a crisis. But alongside funding, countries will need to protect them from potential attacks.
Last year, the Commission pitched a military mobility package to speed up troop movements across the bloc, and selected 500 priority projects with capitals, spread along four strategic corridors across Europe.
The cost is expected to reach €100 billion, Apostolos Tzitzikostas, the EU’s transport minister, said again during a panel discussion on Tuesday, including some €17 billion earmarked for military mobility in the next seven-year EU budget.
But that money will be nowhere near enough.
The rest will have to come from national budgets and other EU funding pots, including national recovery plans, cohesion funds, Invest EU and the future European Competitiveness Fund – the defence and space leg of the next seven-year budget – Tzitzikostas added.
“It will cost”, Greek Defence Minister Nikos Dendias said during the panel, referring to the “staggering” €100 billion figure and urging Europeans to move quickly to find the funding.
General Seán Clancy, chairman of the European Union Military Committee, agreed that budgets for military mobility would need to increase.
He said the €17 billion earmarked for military mobility “will go a long way but is not enough”.
The bloc’s defence ministries have created national task forces to deliver the 500 projects, Tzitzikostas said.
But it is unclear when they will all be finalised. The transport commissioner expects the most urgent ‘hotspots’ to be completed by 2030, aligning with the Commission’s timeline for preparing to deter any conventional attack.
Defending infrastructure
The transport commissioner also warned countries had to make sure such infrastructure was protected against hybrid threats, amid increasing drone incursions and acts of sabotage blamed on Russia.
Tunnels, ports and highways will need to be protected against potential attacks, Tzitzikostas said.
The Commission has proposed protection measures in its military mobility package, but negotiations are still ongoing with a final trilogue scheduled on 9 December, two parliamentary staffers said. An earlier trilogue is scheduled for 20 October to address initial sticking points.
Asked how advanced Europe was in protecting strategic infrastructure, Dendias said the bloc was “rather far away”.
Among the measures, the minister suggested the military committee should be given more capabilities to better protect key infrastructure. He added the bloc should build on Greece’s €25 billion defence dome – dubbed the ‘Shield of Achilles’ – to establish a similar pan-European project.
CORRECTION: This article was updated to amend the spelling of Commissioner Apostolos Tzitzikostas.
European Centre for Counterterrorism and Intelligence Studies, Germany & aNetherlands – ECCI
