Abstract
Historically, European armament cooperation takes place under very specific conditions: the European defense market is no free and regular market, as states exercise their influence aiming to retain a certain degree of defense industrial autonomy and trying to keep know-how and jobs in their respective national economies. Nor does it function only according to political will, since governments have to accept the various limitations of their national defense industry in capacity, capability and competitiveness. This situation is likely to remain so for the foreseeable future. Hence, the question is how to balance and moderate these diverging interests to deliver better results than in the past, when collaborative armament projects often suffered from cost overruns and delivery delays. Combining empirical evidence and conceptual approaches, which are able to interweave the logics of both systems, will provide satisfactory explanations for past experiences. Furthermore, it will enable us to develop an understanding of how future collaborations may yield greater chances for success, economically and politically.
Notes
- 1.
All 28 European Union member states except Denmark.
- 2.
“For this purpose, Germany has assumed the lead role in the development of a European MALE UAS (medium-altitude long-endurance unmanned aerial system) as a target solution. In 2015, preparations for a joint definition study were started in cooperation with France, Italy and Spain. The objective of this study is to achieve a multinational consensus on functional requirements on the basis of sound cost estimates. This also contributes to implementing a goal laid down in the current coalition agreement, namely to advance the development of a European unmanned aerial vehicle. The system will only be procured, however, when the capability requirements are met and when operation in general airspace is possible without any major restrictions. In this context, the foundations must be laid for the certification and operation of UAS in European airspace” (German MoD 2016).
- 3.
Leopard 1 successor project “Main Battle Tank 70”, a US-German cooperation, which was canceled in the development/testing phase. Nevertheless, technologies developed and tested during this joint armament project found their way into the respective new main battle tanks of both Germany (Leopard 2) and the USA (M1 Abrams) (McNally 2016).
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Mölling, C., Schütz, T. (2018). European Armament Collaboration: What We Can Learn from History and Concepts. In: Karampekios, N., Oikonomou, I., Carayannis, E. (eds) The Emergence of EU Defense Research Policy. Innovation, Technology, and Knowledge Management. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-68807-7_8
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