Europe Should Arm Before 2027, Learn From Ukraine – EU Commissioner for Defense

The European Union is launching the ReArm Europe program, allocating €800 billion ($873.4 billion) to boost its defense industry and to get EU defense spending up to 3.5% of GDP by 2027 – when there are fears that Russia will expand its invasion beyond Ukraine. 

The EU defense spending ramp-up also comes in the wake of the US, under President Donald Trump showing declining interest in Ukrainian and European defense. 

The €800 billion EU investment will go toward ramping up weapons production, streamlining joint procurement, and reducing reliance on imports, Andrius Kubilius, the Commissioner for the Defence and Space of the European Commission told Ukrainian media outlet Babel in an interview. 

The EU could adopt the plan at the end of this month at the next EU Council meeting, without the need for unanimous support from the council – as a qualified majority would suffice, Kubilius said. 

The European Council is calling for EU countries to increase their defense spending to 3.5%. 

“On average, EU countries currently spend about 2% of GDP … Some EU countries are already spending more than 4%, some are aiming for 5%,” Kubilius told Babel. 

NATO, at its summit in June, will also set a minimum spending plan for Alliance countries, the media outlet wrote. NATO will set parameters for different countries depending on the size of their armed forces and on what equipment their national armies should have in order to implement NATO defense plans. 

“Based on them, we will form a plan: what our industries should produce, how much it will cost. Then we will know better how much we need to invest [in joint defense],” Kubilius told Babel.

Kubilius said Ukraine is an example of how a country can develop a military industry seemingly overnight. 

“Your government has provided us with statistics: in 2022, Ukraine was capable of producing weapons worth €1 billion per year. Now it is about €35 billion per year. If we could learn from you, that would be very good,” Kubilius told Babel. 

The EU can collaborate with Ukraine’s defense industry in two ways: 

• By making sure that Ukraine has access to European industrial programs
• Through the “Danish model” of procurement, where European governments purchase Ukrainian-made weapons from Ukrainian manufacturers directly. 

Will Europe develop a defense industry before Russia attacks?

The EU’s defense industries are fragmented, Kubilius said.  

To fix this, EU countries should spend their defense budgets on joint procurement – for example, on purchasing large quantities of the same type of tank. 

“If several countries collectively need 1,200 tanks, it would be good to buy them from one manufacturer,” Kubilius said. 

The so-called European Defence Industrialisation Programme (EDIP) can serve this need, Kubilius said. 

Europe should rush to get it done before 2027 due to the high risk of Russia expanding its aggression to other European nations. 

“As we know, according to intelligence, Russia may be ready to attack the EU and NATO member states in the next five years. So we need to be very practical. We really need to accelerate,” Kubilius told Babel.

“We need to show Putin our economic power translated into military power. And quickly. If we do nothing, Putin will produce three times more weapons than all NATO countries combined. In three months, Putin can produce more weapons than all NATO countries, including the United States, Great Britain, and Europe, can produce in a year. So we need to catch up,” he said.