Military Reforms: Closing the Capability Gap

Abstract

While EU member states have not suffered a terrorist outrage as large as the attacks on the United States on 11 September 2001, they are all fully aware that they are also targets. The 191 deaths from Islamic extremist-linked attacks in Madrid on 11 March 2004 demonstrated that all European states are at risk. The attacks in November 2003 on UK commercial and diplomatic facilities in Turkey reminded Europe that these threats are international in nature. For over 50 years, most western European states have depended on collective security through NATO. Facing a potential armed threat from the Soviet Union, they shared their defence requirements, and drew heavily on US resources. In the new world of international terrorism, NATO is less well-suited to providing defence from the threat.