Neighbours and traditional military partners, with similar ambitions and responsibilities, France and the United Kingdom are subject to strategic constraints that bring them close together. The author argues in favour of a Franco-British response to twenty-first century conflict through the building of a new core of defence cooperation to which their European neighbours would surely be drawn.
The UK-France Defence Relationship
Those charged with managing the defence enterprise throughout Western Europe find themselves facing a perfect storm of challenges. They must negotiate a myriad range of threats and seize fleeting strategic opportunities. Otherwise they run the risk of being sidelined as the new world structures are written by forces that may at best bypass them, at worst trample them underfoot.
All this must be carried through in a political environment of popular distrust of institutions, disengagement with political parties and overwhelming fiscal tightening.
The United Kingdom and France—Similar Views of an
Uncertain world
The two leading defence powers in the region, the United Kingdom and France, have both recently addressed the nature of the threat, and have gone some way towards setting a course to meet it. Their individual positions are characterised by a mix of fundamental certainties and uncertainties.
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