 Thank you very much, Mari, for that very kind introduction. It's really a pleasure to be home. And of course, it's an honour to speak at the Institute for International and European Affairs for the second time. And I want to thank Ben Tonner and Mari Kross from the Security and Defence Group for inviting me to speak to you today about the future of EU defence policy. Now, originally when we had discussed this idea with Ben and Mari, we thought it might be interesting to talk about what progress has been made since 2013, what will come out of the summit that was held last week. If I do that, it will be a very short speech because no progress has been made and defence wasn't even discussed at last week's summit because of course there were many other crises to deal with whether it's Greece or migration or Russia and so on. So I won't focus so much on that but I will try and focus on something that was decided at the summit. The EU leaders, the heads of government, gave a mandate to the high representative for foreign policy, Federica Mogherini, to draw up what they call a global strategy on EU foreign and security policy and to write this strategy in time for a summit in June 2016. So she has a year to do this process. And it's sort of but not only updating the European Security Strategy of 2003, it will be broader. It's not just about security, it's broader foreign policy. But of course there will be a CSDP component at least in the debate. I'm not sure the strategy will actually say much about CSDP specifically, but it will certainly impact the debate on the future of EU defence policy and indeed the future of EU defence policy is crucial for the future of EU foreign policy because as we know EU defence policy is not a defence policy. It's actually part of EU foreign policy. The EU is not a military alliance. It doesn't do the business of territorial defence the way NATO does, for example. So I'll start off just with a few remarks about our changing security environment. Now I think it's fairly obvious to say that the strategic environment we're facing is rapidly becoming much more challenging and in particular in the EU's broad neighbourhood which frankly is in a mess. And the turbulence that is ongoing there I think will continue across this broad neighbourhood for a very long time. To take one example, Russia is going to be a major security challenge for the EU for many years to come. Not just because of its aggression in Ukraine or its enclaves in Moldova or Georgia but also because of its own internal weaknesses. Russia has serious demographic decline and an over-reliance on energy exports for economic growth. And we've seen the negative impact the oil price has had on Russia's economy along with the sanctions of course. And in a way I would argue that Russian aggression is actually masking its fragility which means that Russia is going to really remain a very serious security challenge for a long time to come. Looking south there is increasing disorder across the Middle East. In fact disorder I would argue is the new normal in the Middle East. Consider Libya, consider Syria, Iraq, Yemen and so on. But on top of these ongoing conflicts the structural factors that created the Arab Spring by that I mean demographic growth in contrast to Russia, resource shortages, economic stagnation, these are going to intensify in the years ahead and they are going to contribute to more instability in the future on top of the ongoing conflicts. Consider for example the average, the about 50% of the population of Iraq is under 19 half the population. That is a serious socioeconomic challenge for instance. And in general if you look at the broad neighbourhoods including the Sahel, West Africa, even stretching not just Eastern Europe, the Caucasus over to Central Asia most or I think the majority of the world's fragile states or failing states or even failed states are within that broad space. Europe's broad neighbourhood is the ozone hole currently of global security. This space, so we will be very busy for many years to come. Now of course Europe's neighbourhood is not just Europe's neighbourhood, it's Russia's neighbourhood, it's Turkey's neighbourhood, it's Japan's neighbourhood, it's India's neighbourhood and it's increasingly China's neighbourhood. But we will likely have to deal and respond autonomously as Europeans to more crises in the future because the United States is much more ambiguous and much more selective about what it's willing to do or not to across our neighbourhood with the exception of the Gulf but in the rest of the neighbourhood the United States is much more selective but in the rest of the neighbourhoods we cannot expect the United States to solve our security problems or solve all our security problems in the future. We will have to do it ourselves increasingly and you see this already if you look at the 30 or so CSDP, EU defence operations, EU peace operations really that we've carried out all bar two of those 30 or so were carried out in that broad neighbourhood. The two exceptions are Afghanistan and Malaysia in Indonesia but all the others were carried out in that broad space in the neighbourhood which I think tells us something. This is not to say of course that we don't have global security interests maritime security in East Asia and I know this is of interest to Mark Millet for example is a serious security issue for Europeans as well but precisely because we cannot do very much about it partly because we're so busy and precisely because the US is increasingly focusing on China and China is the biggest question facing the international system today and this is why the US is becoming much more selective about its activity in our neighbourhood that means that we will have to do more ourselves to cope with security challenges in that broad space. Now I do want to emphasise that Europeans won't and don't always act through the European Union they act through the United Nations they act through NATO or they act nationally I think the French operations for example in Mali or the Central African Republic are very good examples of that and of course sometimes the EU works with the United Nations in Chad or Mali or works with NATO in Kosovo Afghanistan and so on so it's not a simple either or either and of course this is not just about using military force the EU tries to mix many different instruments but the majority of CSDP the vast majority of CSDP operations have been civilian and so the EU only uses military force when it really really feels it's necessary but it is bearing in mind that any serious foreign policy needs a military component consider Irish farm policy Irish farm policy basically does three things we do diplomacy treaties at the EU level or international treaty we do development of course and we have an outstanding record on development and we do peacekeeping the defence component if you like and our defence forces have an outstanding record in international peacekeeping likewise if the EU wants a serious foreign policy the EU needs a serious military option and of course if you have a military option you should be as prepared as you possibly can for many different types of contingencies that you have and CSDP is an important option for European governments because the UN may not always be quick enough to act NATO may not always be available if the United States is not interested and of course France may not always be able to act alone right so CSDP is an important option however if we look at the record of the 30 or so EU operation since 2003 30 is an impressive figure so there's been a lot of quantity but I would argue there's not been a huge amount of quality there are some exceptions Chad is a very good example which our defence forces led the counter piracy operation of Somalia is another excellent example but frankly some of the operations have been very small and very ineffective and pretty much a waste of money so I would like to see more quality the EU for instance has not done what the UN has done in Lebanon or in Congo the EU should be trying to do more of those types of more serious robust and substantial operations now of course CSDP EU defence policy when it was conceived in 1999 it was launched at the Cologne summit in June 1999 it was conceived as a crisis management policy essentially that means doing everything but territorial defence that's fine these days though the EU seems to do everything but crisis management and this is the focus at the moment is very much on capacity building, training, equipping and I really wonder if that is sustainable if you're serious about having an effective contribution to international security particularly given the range of the security challenges that I try to outline in the EU's neighbourhood it's dangerous to assume that EU defence policy will only do capacity building for the next decade and beyond partly because as we know when you're doing for example military training operation a peacekeeping operation can quickly look like war fighting we saw what our defence forces went through with undef on the Golan Heights we've seen it in Afghanistan Europeans have had that experience as well secondly the EU sent from Mali to back up the French military intervention there but what if France had needed more robust help would we just stand there looking at them even though they are actually making an intervention that is for the benefit of our security or thirdly and this is maybe a bit more controversial if there was another Libya style crisis like the 2011 crisis and the United States said we will not intervene and don't forget there was a debate in Washington at the time the Pentagon did not want to intervene in Libya actually and would have been happy to leave it to Britain and France and other Europeans but if the next time the US said we're not going to do it, this is your problem and I don't think the US would be particularly keen to intervene in Libya today what would we do what would the Europeans do I leave that as an open question perhaps for the debate so in other words I'm trying to describe really that the strategic demand for a more effective EU defence policy is growing but I would argue that there is a very strange dichotomy in EU defence policy because the strategic demand on the one hand is growing but the political interest in national capitals on the other hand is actually weakening, it's actually lessening and we should ask ourselves why is that the case given all these security challenges which are intensifying this should be the moment that the EU really shows what it's made of CSTP has existed what 15, 16 years now 16 years and it doesn't have a huge amount to show surely this is the time that the EU can really show what it's made of but it's not showing that yet and there are a few reasons for this it seems to me one is very understandably Europeans are weary and wary of military interventions some Europeans invaded and it failed some Europeans invaded and didn't occupy Libya and it failed and some Europeans neither invaded nor occupied Syria and it has failed so military interventions do not have a good reputation and I think it's quite understandable there are counter examples I would argue I would argue that the interventions in the western Balkans and the effort since on peacekeeping on development on state building has been actually quite successful but it's precisely because of that effort since that it showed that the military intervention was worth doing so we shouldn't just assume that military interventions are always a bad idea so that is one factor and of course if you look for example at the European contributions to international peacekeeping or international deployments they've actually have since 2008 I think there were around 80,000 soldiers deployed on various operations NATO UNEU national in 2008 it's less than 40,000 now today so that tells you something the interest the willingness to carry out international operations has lessened to a huge degree I think a second reason why there's less political interest in CSTP is the Ukraine crisis because that has placed a huge emphasis on territorial defense rather than external operations which means fewer resources will be available for external operations if countries are focusing more on territorial defense particularly at a time where defense resources have fallen in a nutshell the Ukraine crisis has been a shot in the arm for NATO but it may prove to be a shot in the leg for CSTP if there are fewer resources available for expeditionary operations because this is what CSTP does external operations are the oxygen of EU defense policy now linked to that there are two emerging divisions in European defense one is functional this territorial versus expeditionary debate and the other is geographic those who are focused more on the east and those who are focused more on the south and you see this for instance the recent polish national security strategy is very focused on Eastern Europe hardly says anything about the Middle East or the southern part of the neighborhood and the new Italian white book is very focused on the Mediterranean and maintaining or developing military primacy in the Mediterranean as they put it so it's a very clear example of this divide now there is some overlap it's not a smooth division between the two groups and there are some countries like France and the UK who try and focus on both and try and be able to do both defense territorial defense and expeditionary but these divisions are emerging and a final reason why there is a lack of political interest in EU defense policy at this time is that there are big divisions big differences between the big three the big three meaning France Germany and the UK and essentially the UK is not very keen on acting through the EU for its foreign policy Germany is not very keen on using military force externally and France is stuck in the middle which is why France has had to mainly act nationally now the German debate is changing to some degree and you know Foreign Minister Steinmeier Defense Minister von der Leyen President Gauke have all made speeches saying Germany needs to wake up and assume more leadership and contribute more to international security and assume more responsibility and like Ireland Germany is going through its own defense white book process at the moment and I had the pleasure of speaking at one of their preparatory seminars for the Vice Book in Brussels recently and the Minister von der Leyen was there all day and very unusually for a politician she actually listened all day and said nothing and that was very refreshing I'm not used to politicians listening to me so that was really quite interesting but what struck me in that debate was that Germany is clearly very comfortable acting through NATO particularly on territorial defense it's comfortable with trying to beef up NATO's efforts because of the Ukraine crisis but it's very uncomfortable with external deployments and doing anything beyond training and equipping capacity building Germany is one of the biggest contributors for example to the EU training mission in Mali but doing anything beyond that makes Germany very nervous and the reality is that EU defense policy is likely to do more than the German political market can bear so if Germany does not change its attitude on the external use of force even though there is a very interesting debate developing in Germany until Germany really starts to be willing to do more I'm skeptical that CSTP will do much more than training and equipping if Germany only wants to do training and equipping the other factor of course is Brexit now I doubt that David Cameron will want to appear or sound to pro EU defense policy over the next 18 months, 2 years of the referendum debate headlines of British Armed Forces subsumed by Euro Army are probably the last thing he would like to see so we can't expect too many positive noises publicly at least from London but I think more seriously though if the UK left the EU that would do tremendous damage to the military credibility of EU defense policy because the UK and France are the Deutschmarks of EU defense policy they are the two that set the standard and if you lose half of that that greatly damages the credibility aside from the fact that we all lose if the UK leaves the EU would be greatly damaging for the EU as a whole but it would certainly greatly damage EU defense policy and this lack of political interest and a lack of a coherent vision or coherent ambition explains why there has been so little progress on developing military capabilities or better armed forces on opening up defence markets on defence industrial consolidation on pooling and sharing defence money there's been very little progress just to give one small fact in 1999 when EU defense policy was launched the EU member states who were then 15 could deploy and sustain around 7.5% of their armed forces in 2015 the EU 28 can deploy and sustain around 7.5% of their armed forces so there clearly hasn't been much progress in that area because of this lack of political interest which is pretty poor now of course this strategy debate may help at least revitalise the discussions on EU defence policy and maybe the next summit or another summit will actually discuss defence policy in detail because of course this strategy there will be a discussion on EU values but there will also be a discussion on EU interests international interests and of course on security challenges and how are we going to tackle these security challenges not only through CSDP or not only with the military instrument but CSDP is part of it at least among think tankers which cancel nothing I suppose because you have various sectoral strategies being discussed in Brussels at the moment on trade, on the neighbourhood alongside this foreign policy strategy discussion it would be helpful maybe after the strategy to have a CSDP specific discussion with a CSDP specific document not a white book necessarily but some sort of guidelines might be helpful so if the strategy led to that that would actually be quite useful but I wouldn't bet on that happening so what does this kind of strange dichotomy this strategic demand versus political interest dichotomy, what does this mean for Ireland I think there's a few things as we know EU defence policy has been controversial in the past in some referenda on EU treaties but successive Irish governments have been very supportive of EU defence policy in terms of their party or coalition make up why because the whole point of CSDP is to support the United Nations is to support the implementation of international law and is to ensure and encourage that Europeans contribute to international peacekeeping and contribute more therefore to international security added to that the EU is supposed to help tackle security challenges that affect our security because when European security is threatened so it's very much in our interest that the EU can tackle and cope with the variety of challenges we face this is why long air knock etna was sent to the Mediterranean for the search and rescue operation which is not technically a CSDP operation but is to help save lives and to help manage the migration crisis in the Mediterranean because our security is intricably linked with Italian security with German security, with Baltic security and I think we need to understand this in the Irish debate now of course the EU approach to international security very much matches the Irish approach because it's very similar to the UN approach you mix different instruments you use diplomacy, you use the military when necessary you use development, law enforcement and so on and it's also true that the politics of EU defence policy have suited Ireland in many ways because of various differences down the years these differences have ensured that the EU has neither become part of NATO nor become a military alliance which is suited Ireland perfectly and of course our defence forces have benefited enormously working with EU partners not just on capability development but concept development, doctrine development training particularly for example through the Nordic battle group that's of benefit for our defence forces but the main dilemma it seems to me if CSDP is ineffective and if this is an example of Europeans doing less in international security particularly on international peacekeeping that is not in Ireland's interest that is not in Ireland's interest so to conclude if the combination of middle eastern disorder Russian aggression the US pivot to Asia and falling defence budgets doesn't encourage Europeans to cooperate more closely on military matters I really wonder what will how bad do things have to get how serious does the crisis have to become for us to knock our heads together and cooperate more closely and more effectively given the range of challenges we're facing it's getting to the stage now where either we get serious about EU defence policy and we meaning all EU member states not just Ireland or we give up because as long as this strange dichotomy of going strategic demand on the one side and lessening weakening political interest on the other as long as that strange dichotomy of EU defence policy continues well if it continues we will soon see the strange death of EU defence policy thank you very much for your time and attention