Abstract
European defense needs to be reinvented. A double constraint has limited its development. On the one hand, France, which from the outset has been the bearer of a genuine political ambition for Europe, has consistently identified the creation of a defense Europe with the emergence of a political Europe . But this identification is reductive, if not false. Our European partners, on the other hand, have never lifted the taboo on giving NATO priority in defense matters. By rejecting the idea of a defense Europe, they have de facto rendered the project of a political Europe obsolete in the eyes of the French. We therefore need to reinvent : the sovereignty and autonomy of a political Europe obviously include a strategic capability, but they also cover other dimensions - digital, food, energy, industrial, health, etc. At a time of pandemics and globalization in crisis, defense cannot be the sole condition for European sovereignty.
