Civilized Warriors? Professional Disciplines, Ethos, and European Armed Forces

Abstract

“Let us be very clear,” declared NATO Secretary General Lord Robertson in March 2001. “There is, and will be, no single European Army. There will be no standing European Force.” He reassured the audience, “National armed forces will remain just that; national forces under the command of national governments.”1 While he was articulating a NATO position on the development of European armed forces, Robertson might have been distancing NATO, deliberately or subconsciously, from the European Union’s (EU) concept of the development of many of those same national armed forces, which could lead to a single EU Army, Navy and Air Force, in perhaps ten or twenty years’ time. Indeed, the EU generally, and particularly the “Old European” national leaders, are zealously driving forward the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP), the European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP) and – whatever it means – a European Security and Defense Identity (ESDI).2 Are the decision-makers merely ideologists, whose successors in office will preside over bemused, bewildered, and less than competent warriors, or are they truly finding a way towards comprehensible, comprehensive, and effective security arrangements for the greater peace and stability of the world? Indeed, one should probably look even farther afield, to the forty-four nations that come together in the EuroAtlantic Partnerships Council (EAPC), spread geographically from North America to the Urals, in promoting military professionalism as an integral factor of developing international stability. The aim of this article is to explore certain qualitative principles, competencies, and criteria as means of professionalizing the armed forces of Europe, building internal and international confidence, and thereby assisting in the extension of democracy and security.3 The term “disciplines” is used inten-