The EU’s Member States and European Defence

This brief reviews the range of views of EU member states on the most important ESDP provisions in the Lisbon Treaty: permanent structured cooperation, the mutual assistance clause, the mutual solidarity clause, the High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, and the President of the European Council. Permanent structured cooperation is intended to allow those Member States “whose military capabilities fulfil higher criteria and which have made more binding commitments to one another in this area with a view to the most demanding missions shall establish permanent structured cooperation within the Union framework”. The purpose of the solidarity clause is to ensure mutual assistance to help countries deal with a terrorist attack, a natural or man-made disaster. By contrast, the mutual assistance clause binds all member states to provide aid and assistance “by all means in their power” in the event of another Member State becoming a victim of armed aggression, without prejudicing the neutrality or relationship to NATO that some Member States may enjoy. The roles of the High Representative and the President of the European Council are more vaguely described in the Treaty, but are in general intended to give greater
coherence and continuity to the Union’s actions in the fields of external and defence policy.

Member states have been grouped into five different basic categories – Central and Eastern European, Mediterranean, Benelux, neutral/non-aligned and the so-called ‘big three’. Denmark is not included in any of these groups, because of its opt-out from ESDP.