Verheugen: Planned defence research will be ringfenced

Commissioner Günter Verheugen declared himself optimistic as to the possibility of creating the right conditions for the European Defence industry. He advocated exploiting the 'dual use' possibilities between civil and defence industry, which is now "the rule". He also underlined the strong committment in the Commission to secure proposed defence research spending, and he further said that he had 'ringfenced' it before the upcoming budget talks in an agreement with research commissioner Janez Potocnik.

"Like it or not, EU is about to become a global player. And not in the same sense as the US. We still miss a clear sense of what it will mean. EU needs a better public debate, until now it has been of poor quality," said Verheugen, stating a need for the EU's soft power capacity to also become a 'robust power' in peacekeeping. 

Senior Fellow of the Brookings Institution and former White House advisor on Homeland Security, Richard Falkenrath, pointed to what he called an "asymmetry of effort" between the US and Europe in measures to prevent terrorism which leaves Europe at risk of attracting terrorist attacks because it will be seen as the easier target. 

Falkenrath further stated that a major reorganisation of security structures in the EU after the 11 September attacks was still needed. "The wall between intelligence and law enforcement communities has not been torn down," he said, claiming that  Spanish police were not given all relevant available information from the country's intelligence services prior to the 11 March bombings.  Falkenrath also called for the EU not to spend millions of euros on new defence research, but rather to "go for the low hanging fruit that is around".   

Jorge Bento Silva, Principal Administrator of the Commission's Directorate General for Justice, Freedom and Security  countered Falkenrath's last allegation by saying that the EU indeed had specific security research needs of its own. The EU would thus be interested in developing existing Swiss technology to identify the exact origins of an explosive. This is something that US is not interested in developing for fear of litigation against the producers of explosives, according to Silva. 

He said that the EU's present objective was "not a policy to provide gadgets, but rather an identification of crucial needs. Standardisation rather than regulation is the approach we need".

He further predicted that the world's security needs will not go away, and in this Silva saw an opportunity for Europe to develop a competitive edge in defence technology as it has managed to do in the field of environmental technology and energy saving.

Victor Aguado, CEO of Eurocontrol, which among other issues manages European civil and military airspace,  advocated the need to leverage and share existing information sources to bolster security:"We can get a lot of security from interfacing the systems that are already a hand. We need sharing between NATO, EU, Europol and Eurocontrol. A lot of information already exists. Some security needs will require new technology, others will not," he said.

Diego Ruiz Palmer,head of planning section of crisis management at NATO, spoke of the need for "leaner" organisational structures, and the need for a difficult change towards a new mental mindset with 'around the clock crisis preparedness'.

Markus Hellenthal, Senior Vice President of homeland security,  EADS, underlined that the new threats were marked by their unpredictability, and he found that the current preparedness with respect to most security organisations was characterised by several important shortcomings:  "Fragmentation on all regional, national and international capacities and undersized or inexistent coordination means. Information overkill caused by outdated IT capabilities and stand alone systems, which are lacking modern and real time intelligence exchange capabilities as well as decision support systems. Limited national budgets either for capacity enhancement or for future technologies development."  Hellenthal argued that R&D for new technologies is key for the fight against the evolving threats. Priority should be given by EU to the creation of inter-operable systems as a basis for seamless and real time collaboration across security organisation boundaries and national borders, he said. 

James Moseman, Director of Europe and NATO, at the defence company Northrop Grumman, said that a host of technologies ranging from surveillance, command and control to scanning and detecting and information technologies were available or being developed. But pointed to a lack of coordination of requirements to defence equipment and an unfortunate "proliferation of standards and a political dimension to procurement that may inhibit real competition". Moseman predicted that lack of common standards and an open market will lead to a scenario where "security products will come later, be less capable and will cost more".