European Union

Poland Set for Biggest-Ever Increase in Military Spending

By Jan Cienski, Financial Times

What Kaliningrad Means for Europe’s Values and Interests

By Judy Dempsey, Strategic Europe

From Judy Dempsey, Strategic Europe:  The Russian exclave of Kaliningrad plays a special role between Moscow, Warsaw, and Berlin.

Gap Between French Ambitions and Cuts in Deployable Forces

By Julian Lindley-French, New Atlanticist

From Julian Lindley-French, New Atlanticist:  On 29 April the French published their first defense review in over twenty years.

Will Europe Choose to Be a Security Provider?

By Sven Biscop, New Atlanticist

From Sven Biscop, New Atlanticist:  In December 2013 the heads of state and government of the European Union (EU) will discuss defense.

Arctic Council Adds Six Members, Including China

By Steven Lee Myers, New York Times

From Steven Lee Myers, New York Times: The Arctic Council agreed on Wednesday to expand to include six new nations, including China, as observer states, as a changing climate opens the Arctic to increasing economic and political competition.

Hollande’s Survival Mode Endangers Survival

By Nicholas Dungan

From his 75 percent income tax to his 25 percent approval ratings, François Hollande, the French president who took office one year ago, has already been judged the hapless Louis XVI on the eve of the French Revolution or the feckless René Coty who presided over the demise of the Fourth Republic. But what has […]

The Growing Franco-German Schism

By Frederick Kempe

 Occasionally a public opinion survey surfaces that signals a seismic event. That is the case with a new report from the Pew Research Center that measures the widening tremors of a political earthquake now shaking Europe. Although the report leads with evidence that  Europeans are increasingly losing faith in the European Union (which I wrote […]

Europe’s Strategic Future: Implications of the Eurozone Crisis

By Atlantic Council and the Royal United Services Institute

The Atlantic Council and the Royal United Services Institute have issued a joint publication entitled Europe’s Strategic Future: Implications of the Eurozone Crisis. The report features perspectives from the United States, the United Kingdom, and India analyzing how the Eurozone crisis is likely to impact Europe’s role in the world. Download the PDF

Defense: And What Will Europe Do?

By Sven Biscop

The debate about European defense tends to focus on the need to spend more and deploy more. One deceptively simple question is usually ignored: why? Americans seem to assume that more European capabilities will be deployed where it is convenient for the United States. Europeans just seek to avoid the difficult debate that it would […]

Poland’s Foreign Minister: ‘I’m Afraid Conflict in Europe is Imaginable’

By Radek Sikorski, Foreign Affairs

From Radek Sikorski, Foreign Affairs:  Our relations with Russia, like yours, are pragmatic but brittle.