This book is about European ground and air forces after the Cold War and the potential role they might - or might not - play in shaping a pragmatic, common European foreign and security policy. It deals with future co-operation between West European armies and air forces. Challenges, in the form of politico-military strategic interests at stake and the corresponding risks, as well as the possible responses to these challenges, in the form of national and multilateral military doctrines and the execution thereof, are scrutinized and dealt with.
First, in Chapters Two (James Gow), Three (François Mermet), and Four (Stephen Cambone), the strategic rationale and the political-military implications of an overall European security and defence policy are discussed. Next, Chapters Five (Trevor Taylor), Six (Madeleine Sandström), and Seven (Lothar Rühl) deal with the harmonization and restructuring of national defence policies and their tools. Chapters Eight (Tony Mason), Nine (Jan Folmer), and Ten (Luc Stainier), then concentrate on the role, missions and means of the ground, air and joint components of a collective European military instrument for the implementation of a future European security and defence policy.
Finally, in Chapter Eleven the editor provides an overview of topical highlights and tentative conclusions emanating from both the previous chapters and the discussions during the workshop of experts that was held in conjunction with this book.
This book is of interest to European policy-makers, defence planners, officers-under-training in military and defence academies, and students of international relations, political science and European security.