How to Make PeSCo a Success

After years of soul-searching on defence, the European Union has been trying to bite the bullet. On 22 June 2017, European leaders announced their support for an EU defence fund which could change how Europeans cooperate to develop the capabilities they need. They concomitantly announced they were gearing up for a more flexible way of building defence cooperation1 and some of them move first steps toward the definition of binding commitments in this domain.2 The chosen mechanism is one that was dormant since 2009 in the Lisbon Treaty and which goes by the name of permanent structured cooperation (PeSCo). It basically enables the Union to make progress on defence, without waiting for everyone around the table to agree. On 13 July, Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron pushed a Franco-German deal whereby PeSCo should be inclusive, but also based on a number of ambitious criteria. The coming months will help to ascertain whether this is feasible, how it might be put in place, and at what political cost as regards to the EU27…