BRUSSELS - A permanent civilian-military planning center based here may be proposed when France assumes the European Union presidency in July.
A so-called "operational center," which has carried out mock military exercises, was established here in January 2007, and France may recommend it be made a permanent fixture.
Other French ideas include a military exchange program between EU countries along the lines of the Erasmus program for educational exchanges, and reviewing how contributions are made from a common EU budget known as the Athena mechanism for European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP) missions.
Writing in a monthly review called National Defence and Collective Security in February, Jean-Pierre Jouyet, France's EU affairs minister, said the European Union must have a permanent planning center for operations here. Officially, the French Defense Ministry declined to set out its plans, saying it is "premature" to do so two months ahead of the start of its six-month presidency.
There are five member-state headquarters for operations: France, Germany, Greece, Italy and the United Kingdom. Paris is the headquarters for an ongoing ESDP mission to Chad and the Central African Republic.
The Paris headquarters will host a mock crisis-management exercise later this year, which will start off as a civilian operation before turning into a military one when the operation goes wrong, an EU source said.
U.K. Prime Minister Gordon Brown and French President Nicolas Sarkozy have discussed a permanent center being established for operational use in 2009-10 if other EU member states agree.
Poland also seems supportive of the idea. Polish Defense Minister Bogdan Klich was quoted by the International Herald Tribune on April 25 as saying, "we are in favor of a much stronger role for European defense, and that would include a military headquarters."
Nick Witney, former chief executive of the European Defence Agency and currently senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said there is "a great opportunity" to make progress on the ESDP following the new dynamic Sarkozy introduced by his opening up toward the United States and NATO.
"It is also highly significant that the U.S. has responded with their first unambiguous welcome for European defense. After 10 years, they've released the brake," he said.
In a speech in Paris on Feb. 22, U.S. Ambassador to NATO Victoria Nuland said, "Europe needs, the United States needs, NATO needs, the democratic world needs, a stronger, more capable European defense capacity" and that "an ESDP with only soft power is not enough."
Looking further ahead, according to the EU's Lisbon Treaty, which is in the process of being ratified by EU member states, "member states whose military capabilities fulfill 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 with the Union framework."
Witney explained that "France will no doubt push on with plans on how to develop the pioneer group concept of 'permanent structured cooperation' as set out in the Lisbon Treaty. But they are unlikely to finalize things during their EU presidency."
A key issue that needs to be thrashed out is the criteria for membership of this pioneer group, and how many countries would be involved at the outset.
"It looks as if the treaty has been drafted with the idea of a sort of defense euro zone with a hard core of six or eight countries going further and faster than the others on defense," said Witney, who pointed out that "member states are beginning to realize that this is not such a good model, as it would mean encouraging the remaining two-thirds of member states to shrug their shoulders and abandon their efforts.
"Work is now going on to make it more inclusive, bringing in those with something worthwhile to offer, be that in terms of operations or collaborative projects, in a more flexible structure," he added.
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