Italian Deputy Prime Minister Antonio Tajani has joined the growing chorus calling for the formation of a European Union Army, arguing that sacrificing the national sovereignty of member states is worth the tradeoff for security.
Antonio Tajani, who took over as the leader of the centre-right Forza Italia party following the death of former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi last year and who currently serves both foreign minister and deputy prime minister in the Giorgia Meloni coalition government, argued that one of the top reforms needed for the European Union is the formation of a collective military among the 27 countries that constitute the bloc.
Speaking to the Italian La Stampa newspaper, Tajani said: “If we want to be bearers of peace in the world, we need a European army. And this is a fundamental precondition for having an effective European foreign policy. In a world with powerful players like the United States, China, India, and Russia, with crises ranging from the Middle East to the Indo-Pacific, Italian, German, French or Slovenian citizens can only be protected by something that already exists, and it’s called the European Union.
“Therefore, defence and a common army must become a concrete fact. No longer postponable. National resistance to sharing even these ‘pieces of sovereignty’ will always be strong, but if we remain divided we will always be defenceless sparrows in a world where eagles fly.”
The Italian deputy prime minister claimed that the countries of the EU need to collectivise their military spending or face being “out of the game”. Tajani pushed back on the idea that it would be an offensive force, however, saying that an EU Army should rather be a force for “peacekeeping, monitoring, and deterrence.”
While the formation of an EU Army was previously dismissed as a conspiracy theory by anti-Brexit activists in Britain in the runup to the independence referendum in 2016, Brussels has been steadily making steps towards creating a single military for years.
In addition to creating a fully integrated military, the Italian politician also argued that Brussels should consolidate its top leadership into one position, giving the power of European Commission president and European Council president to one person.
“We cannot have two presidents,” he said, adding that although there will likely be pushback against the idea, “this current, two-headed structure has had its day.”
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