The Reform of Defence

Abstract

The publication of a defence white paper in March 1994 was evidence that the post-Cold War adaptation of French defence policy had reached a point of intellectual maturity. By 1994 there was considerable agreement about the nature of the post-Cold War security context, the lessons of the Gulf War, the defence and security implications of the Maastricht treaties, the lessons of the conflicts in the former Yugoslavia, the nature of a new French ‘international mission’, the impact of technical military developments, and the broad aims and objectives of French defence and security policy. This did not mean that a new consensus had appeared – there remained sharp differences in particular about Franco-NATO relations, nuclear weapons and the defence budget – but it did mean that the post-Cold War ‘champ de bataille’ of the defence debate was becoming clear and that debates inside France were increasingly centring on the detail rather than the broad lines of policy, on means rather than ends, and on the pace rather than the trajectory of change.