Abstract
The steps taken last year to establish the Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) may remind us of the efforts made by several countries after the Second World War to build a European Defence Community (EDC). Here I assess the measures taken by London, Paris, Brussels, Bonn and Washington, and recall the wars of Indochina and Korea. Though widely considered a failure, the EDC project in fact led to the foundation of a new institution, the Western European Union (WEU), which has complemented NATO’s objectives for many years.
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Notes
- 1.
The Treaty of Economic, Social and Cultural Collaboration and Collective Self-Defence, was signed in Brussels on 17 March 1948 by Belgium, France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. It enters into force on 25 August 1948.
- 2.
Because of the significance of his ‘Schuman Declaration’ on 9 May 1950, this day has been designated as ‘Europe Day’.
- 3.
The Conference considered the “Spoftord Proposals” for German forces to be wholly integrated under NATO command.
- 4.
The Paris Conference considered the Pleven Plan that offered the possibility of a long-term political solution to the German problem through a political unity in a community ([1], p. 66).
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Jiménez-Ugarte, J. (2020). From the European Defence Community to Permanent Structured Cooperation. In: Ramírez, J.M., Biziewski, J. (eds) Security and Defence in Europe. Advanced Sciences and Technologies for Security Applications. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-12293-5_6
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