Welcome to Wider Europe, RFE/RL's newsletter focusing on the key issues concerning the European Union, NATO, and other institutions and their relationships with the Western Balkans and Europe's Eastern neighborhoods.
I'm RFE/RL Europe Editor Rikard Jozwiak, and this week I'm drilling down on two issues: boosting European defense spending, and how the bloc is dealing with (or not dealing with) Georgia's controversial new president.
Briefing #1: How Can The EU Boost Its Defense Spending?
What You Need To Know: One of the biggest talking points in Brussels this year is European defense and how to boost it. This discussion has gained momentum due to Russian advances in Ukraine and the pressure from a new U.S. administration. U.S. President Donald Trump has reiterated that 5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) should be the new benchmark for defense spending -- a target that no EU nation is currently meeting.
It is therefore no surprise that Poland -- which, with 4.7 percent, is the bloc's highest defense spender in terms of the share of its national budget -- has adopted the official slogan "Security, Europe" for its ongoing EU presidency. And defense will be the only topic on the agenda when the 27 EU leaders gather on February 3 at Chateau de Limont, close to Brussels, for an informal summit.
Deep Background: Two guests are invited to that summit: Firstly, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who will meet all his EU counterparts together for the first time. That will pave the way for a proper EU-U.K. summit later in the year, where the potential for more concrete defense cooperation between London and Brussels can be hammered out.
The second guest is NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, who has heeded Trump's 5 percent call. Rutte recently noted that European nations need to ramp up spending considerably and, if not, "then start your Russian language courses or go to New Zealand."
EU officials have also dialed up the rhetoric. The new EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas has talked up intelligence reports noting that Moscow could test the bloc's readiness to defend itself in 3-5 years and noted that, in 2024, the 27 EU countries collectively spent an average of 1.9 percent of GDP on defense, while Russia spent 9 percent.
As always on defense, the question is if Europeans can walk the walk and not just talk the talk. The informal summit will not have any formal conclusions or declarations. Instead, the ideas floating around will contribute, by March, to a much-touted European Commission white paper on how to boost EU defense.
After that, leaders will meet again in June in Brussels for a proper summit to hopefully take some decisions. But that same month, the European Commission will publish its proposal for the next long-term EU budget (2028-2034) that will set off all sorts of jockeying in EU capitals, given that the last long-term budget equaled nearly 2 trillion euro ($2.1 trillion). And it is here that EU defense spending may fall by the wayside.
Drilling Down
- The European Commission is likely to push for more cash for defense but will member states in the end agree? Or would they prefer to devote money to other sectors, such as agriculture or the lucrative Cohesion Funds that benefit less affluent regions in the bloc?
- One of the reasons why the abovementioned white paper is coming in March is to avoid it becoming a part of the internal debate in Germany in the run-up to February 23 parliamentary elections. This is because it is likely to contain some controversial ideas on how to boost European defense spending.
- One of those issues would be jointly borrowed EU defense bonds. While joint debt was agreed as a temporary solution to boost the EU economy after the economic shock of COVID-19 lockdowns, it is still anathema among the more frugal northern countries, such as Germany and the Netherlands.
- Another contested idea could be to let the EU's European Investment Bank (EIB) fund defense projects in the bloc -- something it has never done before. EIB raises funds by borrowing on the international capital markets due to its triple-A rating.
- There is, however, a fear in the EU that the bank, by investing in lagging European defense firms, will jeopardize its stellar credit rating.
- In the end, it may fall to member states to simply increasing defense spending. The question is if they can. Many European economies are barely growing, and inflation is a huge issue. France is politically unstable and Germany needs to get around its constitutional limitations on borrowing.
- And then there is the perennial issue -- even if more money is being spent on defense, how can one ensure that the money isn't just going to national defense concerns that produce gear that isn't necessarily compatible with other member states? In other words, is there a genuine political and economic will beyond the Brussels bubble to create a proper EU defense market?
- There is also a tendency within the EU to buy weapons and ammunition from countries such as South Korea, Turkey, and the United States. Some European officials I have spoken to concede that perhaps the best way to pacify Washington could be for a country to increase its defense budget simply by buying more U.S. arms.
Briefing #2: With Georgia, The EU Is In A Diplomatic No-Man's-Land
What You Need To Know: Three months after controversial Georgian parliamentary elections took place on October 26, the EU -- and to a lesser degree NATO -- are still unsure of how to proceed in their relations with Tbilisi.
The issue has become even more complicated as the ruling Georgian Dream party in December 2024 elected and inaugurated Mikheil Kavelashvili as the president of the country. It was the first indirect election of the largely ceremonial head of state in the South Caucasus republic after constitutional changes in 2017 did away with a direct public vote.
Kavelashvili's presidency is disputed by the country's opposition; by Salome Zurabishvili, who still claims the presidency as her own until, she says, a legitimate replacement has been elected; and by some parts of the international community. The European Parliament, in late November 2024, overwhelmingly passed a resolution calling for fresh Georgian elections and rejected the parliament that subsequently elected Kavelashvili.
Deep Background: For the Council of the EU, the most powerful part of the bloc where the 27 EU member states sit, the situation is less clear cut. Operating by consensus on foreign policy matters, the room is divided by countries such as Hungary and Slovakia, which rushed to congratulate Georgian Dream directly in late October 2024, and hawks such as Estonia and Lithuania.
Speaking to several EU officials on background, it appears as if they would prefer to just kick the can down the road on Kavelashvili and not have to deal with Georgia at all at the moment. As one senior official put it: "There is no 'EU deal' on this -- in fact, we have classic EU limbo. Nobody wants to say anything, nobody wants to touch it, and nobody definitely wants to put anything on paper."
A second diplomat I spoke to was even blunter, saying that "we are not taking steps on this right now but, at some point, we will have to face questions on this."
A third source from a country critical of the current regime in Tbilisi was rather gloomy about predicting the future: "It's impossible to have unanimity on nonrecognition policy [of the] Georgian authorities. We will try to keep the line [on] limiting contact with the president and new government as much as possible. But I am afraid with time it will not be possible."
Many EU officials note that the bloc currently only engages with Georgia on a technical level in order to "depoliticize" the situation, but no one knows how long this will go on.
Drilling Down
- There are two other reasons why the EU is unable to move forward. One is the reading of what happened during the controversial parliamentary elections last year. The full OSCE/ODHIR report on the vote, which was released in December 2024, hasn't settled the issue. "We cannot state that the election results were illegal or illegitimate. We still talk about irregularities. We haven't moved beyond that point," one EU official told me on background.
- The second issue is that the EU has a lot going on. When EU foreign ministers met in Brussels for their first council of the year on January 27, they discussed Ukraine, the situation in the Middle East, and then how to deal with the new U.S. administration. Georgia was relegated to the end of the meeting under "Current Affairs." Little was decided when Georgia was discussed by ministers in December 2024.
- Sanctions on leading Georgian Dream officials -- similar to those imposed by the United States -- were shot down and all that was green-lighted was a mostly symbolic measure of new visa requirements for Georgian diplomatic passport holders
- At NATO things are a bit simpler. One official, speaking anonymously because they were not authorized to speak on the record, told me that "the short answer is yes, we see [Kavelashvili] as the Georgian president. The long answer is that it is a difficult situation. Officially. we are not saying much, but if we must invite him to an event like a summit, we would. It is, however, worth pointing out that we don't foresee that Georgian ministers will be invited to NATO ministerials this year, nor any Georgian leaders to the NATO summit in The Hague in June."
- What is also under way in the military alliance is that some joint programs with Georgia might be suspended, notably cooperation with the country's Defense Ministry. This could come after a review, in which all NATO-Georgia cooperation will be scrutinized. The review should be presented to the 32 NATO member states in the coming weeks.
Looking Ahead
EU member states should finally get the European Commission proposal for the next sanctions package on Russia this week. The EU executive has worked on what would be the 16th round of measures against Russia since early January and, according to officials familiar with the topic, says the idea is to target Russian aluminum, agricultural products, liquefied natural gas, and banks, as well as its shadow fleet, which defies embargoes to carry Russian crude oil and petroleum products. Brussels hopes to agree on the package around the third anniversary of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in late February.
That's all for this week! Feel free to reach out to me on any of these issues on Twitter @RikardJozwiak, or on e-mail at jozwiakr@rferl.org.
Until next time,
Rikard Jozwiak
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