Chinese views on European defense integration

• The European Union agreed its most extensive and highest profile effort to advance EU defense integration so far in late 2017: a binding mutualdefense pact – the Permanent Structured Co-operation, or PESCO – sits within a broader set of fresh initiatives to encourage greater, more effective, pan-EU defense spending, investment and joint operations. Anxieties over Russia and over the US commitment to NATO under President Donald Trump have ratcheted up the consequences for Europe’s allies of the EU Global Strategy (EUGS) and PESCO. How it develops will impact China’s foreign policy ambitions too.
• Given the newness of PESCO and EUGS, views from all quarters have tended to be provisional, focused on the implications for NATO’s cohesion, and potential frictions between EU members. Cautious welcomes from NATO and the US were couched firmly within the “3Ds test,” a 20-year old US framework insisting EU defense cooperation must not duplicate, discriminate, or divide Europe from either the US and NATO.
• China’s analysts are watching the EU’s defense integration initiatives closely and alert to impacts on European integration, foreign and defense policy, and China–EU relations. The EU is officially designated an “important strategic partner” and possible “strategic pole” in China’s promotion of a multi-polar international order. Broadly positive views of the EU have become more nuanced due to rising European nationalism and questions about the EU’s survival. Chinese observers have noted Europe faces the trickiest foreign policy environment since the Cold War and regard PESCO and EUGS as a significant new stage and a “reinsurance policy” against U.S. abandonment.
• The paper sets out five ideal-type scenarios for PESCO and EUGS, exploring prospects for success or failure, impacts on the cohesion of the trans-Atlantic alliance, and how China might react. For China, the overwhelming concern in any of these scenarios will be the effect on its potential ability to play the EU as a separate pole undermining US hegemony. China opposes a stronger, more unified NATO and trans-Atlantic alliance that would defend the liberal values underpinning the current international order.

In December 2017, the majority of European Union (EU) nations signed up to the Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) arrangement, the highest profile effort yet to advance EU defense integration (欧盟防务一体化).² With 25 members, PESCO (永久性结构合作协议) is part of a broader set of initiatives supporting the European Union Global Strategy (EUGS; 欧盟全球战略), a package of policies designed to encourage greater, more effective, pan-EU defense spending, investment, and joint operations.

Upon the signing of the initiative, European Council President Donald Tusk declared that PESCO was “bad news for our enemies.”³ Many European observers deem the People’s Republic of China (PRC) an increasing threat to the Continent’s interests, values and security, worrying that Beijing’s “authoritarian advance” poses a direct challenge to the EU’s liberal governance model.⁴ Indeed, attitudes towards China have been hardening across much of Europe recently, and the PRC’s public opinion favorability is under 50 percent across much of Europe.⁵ Reflecting this more negative view of China, Germany’s then Minister of Foreign Affairs Sigmar Gabriel noted at the 2018 Munich Security Conference that “powers such as China[…] are constantly trying to test and undermine the unity of the European Union.”⁶

As the EU steps up its commitment to defense integration, how does China regard PESCO and the broader EUGS? China’s basic policy priorities and geo-strategy suggest some reasons for concern, as it opposes a stronger, more unified NATO and trans-Atlantic alliance. This paper presents some thoughts on how European defense integration might unfold, and how China might react.

With the signing of the 1992 Maastricht Treaty, EU member states agreed to pursue a Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) together with a Common Security and Defense Policy (CSDP) intended to coordinate defense- and intelligence-related policies. The Maastricht Treaty has been amended three times in order to create more efficient and effective policy-making institutions for foreign and defense policies. The most important of these reforms was the creation of the High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy in 1999.⁷

The High Representative is in charge of coordinating the CFSP and CSDP, and is assisted by the European External Action Service (EEAS; established in 2010) and the European Defense Agency (EDA; established in 2004).⁸

The challenge of incentivizing national governments to spend more on defense – in a coordinated, additive, and synergistic manner – remained unresolved. So too did the development of shared policy goals, and an implementation strategy. Coordinating a common EU defense policy was further complicated by US concerns that this might divide the trans-Atlantic alliance, and by anxieties over possible discrimination against non-EU NATO members such as Turkey. Additionally, the United Kingdom, an EU member, was also opposed to any shift in the focus of European defense away from NATO.

For nearly a decade little progress was made until mid-2016, when High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini published an EU Global Strategy intended to energize the CFSP and CSDP.⁹ Over the following eighteen months, spurred by a growing sense  of threat from Russia in the wake of the Crimean crisis together with the rise of populism within Europe, and the UK’s looming departure from the EU plus the election of Donald Trump as US president, the EU sought to enhance its ability to address the growing security threats to the continent, and to press ahead with European integration.¹⁰While the EUGS is a broad vision statement, it includes a new, comprehensive approach to EU defense integration premised on three key elements: a Coordinated Annual Review of Defense (CARD; 联合国防年度审查, sometimes rendered as 年度防务协调评估); a European Defense Fund (EDF; 欧洲防务基金); and a Permanent Structured Cooperation Agreement (PESCO) to facilitate practical defense initiatives (on which more below).

Shortly after the release of the EUGS, in November 2016, the European Commission released a European Defence Action Plan intended to flesh out the dimensions of the EUGS.

Highlighting Europe’s need to “take responsibility for protecting its interests, values, and the European way of life,”  the Action Plan explained that “a stronger European Union in defence […] ultimately means a stronger NATO.”

It reiterated the point at the end of the document, emphasizing the Council’s goal of “ensuring complementarity with NATO.”¹¹

CARD reviews were intended to spur EU member states to meet certain defense spending standards such as spending two percent of their annual GDP on defense, to ensure sufficient contributions to collective security. The EDF, initially funded at EUR 5.5 billion (USD 6.4 billion) per year, was intended to provide seed funding and spur common investments in shared defense industrial development to generate systems for use across EU member states.

In September 2017, member states submitted a list of common commitments to the European Council in the areas of defense investment, capability development, and operational readiness, a step toward further defense integration. On November 13, 2017, ministers signed a common notification on PESCO and on December 11 the Council adopted a decision establishing PESCO and a declaration identifying 17 collaborative projects. PESCO commits the 25 states who opted-in to “join forces on a regular basis, to do things together, spend together, invest together, buy together, [and] act together” with the goal of “jointly develop[ing] defence capabilities and mak[ing] them available for EU military operations.”¹²Unlike previous European defense initiatives, PESCO is binding on members.

Chinese views of European defense integration are a subset of its views of the EU as a whole, marked by an overarching preoccupation with US hegemony and a counter-emphasis on multipolarity.

Indeed, multi-polarity and “the democratization of international relations” are long-standing Chinese foreign policy tropes related to challenging US status and its alliance networks. Normative notions of human rights, democracy and the rule of law are presented as insensitive to each country’s development path and culturally appropriate governance norms.

China issued its first policy white paper on the European Union in 2003, releasing its second formal policy description over a decade later in April 2014. As the 2014 White Paper notes, China and the EU have formed a “comprehensive strategic partnership”; the EU is an “important strategic partner, sharing an important strategic consensus [with China] on [the desirability of] building a multi-polar world”; and the EU has “no fundamental conflict of interests,” with China. The White Paper therefore characterizes the EU as a valuable partner in China’s pursuit of peaceful development and multi-polarity, one that Beijing hopes will “advocate democracy in international relations.”²⁶

As one recent analysis of China’s relations with US allies and European partners put it, China wants to “weaken Western unity, both within Europe and across the Atlantic.”²⁷These aims could be well served by a major EU-US rift. Equally, China could lose out if a stronger Europe increased US willingness to support the liberal international order, or if the EU took up the mantle of the defender of global liberalism. China prefers a “stable – but pliant and fragmented – EU.”²⁸

In 2013, the EU and China agreed on the EU–China 2020 Strategic Agenda for Cooperation, in which China reaffirmed its “support for EU integration” and the two sides noted global trends toward multi-polarity. In addition, the two sides committed to regular dialogues on defense and security policy, more training exchanges, and to “gradually raise the level of EU – China dialogue and cooperation on defense and security, advancing towards more practical cooperation.”²⁹One outcome of the Strategic Agenda was an annual dialogue on security and defense, first held in 2014 when EU Military Committee chairman General Patrick de Rousier met with his Chinese counterparts in Beijing.³⁰Most recently, at the 20th EU–China Summit in Beijing on July 16, 2018, the two sides reaffirmed their commitments to deepening dialogue and partnership, as well as comprehensively implementing the Strategic Agenda, and noted their wide-ranging contacts on foreign and security policy.³¹

Because Chinese official documents tend to adopt formal, polite diplomatic language, seeking  commonalities  while  reserving  differences  (求同存异),  it is often important to look to unofficial Chinese language sources to infer what Chinese observers really think.

Most research on Chinese perspectives on the European supranational project has found an overall positive, if somewhat abstract, set of attitudes towards the EU from the late 1990s into the early 2010s. For example, in 2011, Dekker and van der Noll reported finding that the overwhelming majority of Chinese citizens had a “positive to very positive” impression of the EU.³²Importantly, they found that the majority of respondents obtained their information about the EU primarily from consuming PRC state media, meaning that their impressions reflected positive propaganda images of the EU.

In recent years, however, open source media reporting has found growing skepticism about the EU’s future among Chinese elites. For example, speaking to Deutsche Welle in late 2015, Qiu Yuanlong of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), highlighted the EU’s mounting problems of debt, deep diplomatic divisions, and a weak and disorganized military policy.³³

Recent work by Chang and Pieke has updated this view, noting that the 2016 Brexit vote and rising right-wing nationalism have led to a growing sense of pessimism about the EU’s prospects and ability to solve problems in interna- tional society.³⁴They also note diminished confidence in the EU’s capacity to act as a new “pole” in a multipolar order, something the Chinese government sees as desirable in countering American hegemony.

So far, this has not altered Beijing’s official self-presentation as a partner with the EU in countering an increasingly unilateral United States.³⁵

However, China also recognizes its trust deficit and divergence of interests with the Union, with Foreign Minister Wang Yi reportedly urging European leaders not to cut a separate deal on trade with the US, worrying that the EU might “stab China in the back,” leaving Beijing to confront US belligerence on trade alone.³⁶

Authoritarian China may be ambivalent about a stronger, liberal EU, as an outcome that is not necessarily in China’s interest in the economic or security domains. Some recent European analyses have pointed to China’s “16+1” engagement with Central and Eastern Europe, its Belt and Road Initiative, and investments in economically fragile or authoritarian democracies (namely Greece, Hungary and Turkey) as positioning to promote EU fragmentation, or at least take advantage, through influence and leverage.³⁷Similarly, European observers have long noted Beijing’s tendency to play individual EU member states off against each other, as well as Brussels, especially in trade and investment relations.

Chinese analysts and media commentators have repeatedly sought to rebut such criticism and reassure European audiences of Beijing’s unthreatening intentions. “China is watching with sympathy and hopes that a new EU shall be able to live through all these uncertainties,” according to Zhou Hong, the Deputy Director of the Division of International Studies at CASS.³⁸ Chen Chenchen of Renmin University dismissed suggestions that China uses “divide and conquer” tactics against European partners, arguing that “regional integration is what China advocates more vigorously than ever,” and contending that European analysts who see a threat from China were translating “a strong sense of European anxiety” into something that is “simply a delusion.”³⁹

Turning to perspectives on the EUGS, in May 2017 the China Institute of International Studies (CIIS), a think-tank of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, published a joint assessment that admits to more friction with the EU than unofficial commentators generally acknowledge. The EUGS could “potentially widen the differences between China and Europe on matters of strategy, regional affairs, and security outlook” and intensify economic and diplomatic competition, the CIIS analysts concluded.⁴⁰ At the same time, they noted a formidable list of implementation challenges, including “relatively large economic and financial constraints, member states’ insufficient commitment, and the difficulties of achieving a balance between responding to internal and external [threats].”⁴¹

A contrasting strand of argument sees EUGS positively, as signifying momentum, adaptability and co-operation. Kong Gang of the PLA’s National University of Defense Technology sees Europe moving forward with defense cooperation despite differences in perspectives associated with countries’ unique interests.⁴² Zhou Hong, the Deputy Director the Division of International Studies at CASS, notes the impact of Brexit and the rise of right-wing European nationalism, praising the EU’s quick reactions to “the changing constellation of world powers, including the changes in itself” – presumably meaning Brexit. “Throughout the EUGS, we see a new EU that is more realistic, more reasonable, [and] more willing to cooperate with partners,” and having “a much more realistic assessment of [its] own power and strengths.”⁴³ And Yang Haifeng of the Shanghai European Studies Association similarly praises the EUGS, noting that despite having seen its global influence reduced by some setbacks to its unity in recent years (again, likely a ref- erence to Brexit), the EU “nonetheless remains an important global pole” pursuing a strategy of “principled realism (有原则的事务主义).”⁴⁴

By contrast, Li Meng, writing in PLA Daily, highlights tensions between the EU and NATO. Arguing that the EU’s efforts to establish an independent capacity for military action “have attracted a high degree of attention and vigilance” from NATO, which has in the past seen it as a “competitor, even a challenger” (竞争者甚至挑战者), Li argues that despite all of the communication channels between the two entities “indecisiveness” (议而不决) is becoming a “big problem” that EUGS is unlikely to resolve.⁴⁵

On PESCO specifically, Chinese analyses have tended to be cautious, identifying challenges while also reserving judgment. The common threads are that PESCO represents a new stage, and that is likely to be complicated.

Kang Jie of CIIS calls PESCO “a new stage in European defense cooperation,” though with a long road ahead. (欧盟防务一体化依然任重道远). Noting Europe’s hardest security environment since the Cold War, Kang describes EU defense integration as a “hedging tactic” (一种对冲策略) against an increasingly unreliable, bloated NATO that has “lost focus” through – he says – organizational expansion and mission creep into areas such as “‘humanitarian’ interference” (‘人道主义‘干涉). Despite huge cost incentives in development and procurement, Kang considers defense industrial cooperation has only a 50 percent chance of success.⁴⁶ 

Writing in PLA Daily, Zhao Huaipu and Zhao Jianzhe, both of China Foreign Affairs University, likewise identify “a substantial advance in European defense integration,” and “deep waters” where “gaps in theory and practice cannot be overlooked”.⁴⁷

PLA Daily has carried an overall review of PESCO that refers to it as a “new milestone” (新里程碑), and a “reinsurance” (再保险) plan for Europe if NATO proves unreliable. Again, expansion is seen as problematic – it is “definitely not the case that bigger is better” as countries may have conflicting priorities. The op-ed predicts smaller countries will fear their national defense industries being swallowed up by Germany and France. It also notes that few countries are likely to meet the defense spending goal of two percent of GDP, even by 2024.

Finally, it suggests that the absence of a common threat perception and shared strategy, PESCO states will struggle to agree on which defense investments to abandon.⁴⁸

Given the newness of the various EU agreements and institutions – EUGS is two years old, and PESCO, CARD, and EDF even younger, only tentative conclusions can be drawn. With western English-language assessments at an early stage, it is natural that China’s appraisal of EUGS and related initiatives is also only just unfolding. However, a preliminary assessment shows that Beijing’s Europe analysts, international relations experts, and military-strategic analysts are tracking European integration and EU defense cooperation developments closely.

This section sketches five possible futures for PESCO before drawing conclusions and implications (see figure on page 2).

At least five ideal-type outcomes are imaginable, arrayed along the axes of success/failure and positive/negative impact on the trans-Atlantic alliance.⁴⁹

The EU succeeds in improving policy coordination, R&D, procurement and overall integration in ways additive to NATO. The European pillar of NATO grows stronger, the alliance more cohesive, and European defense and security affairs more certain. Better deterrence of Russia permits the United States to redeploy some forces, reroute funds to modernization, or build-up in the Indo-Pacific.

Scenario 1

For China, this is likely the worst-case scenario, dashing hopes of ‘a separate pole’ balancing the United States. Moreover, if the United States (possibly with partners such as the UK or France, which have sent ships through the South China Sea) devoted more attention and resources to the Indo-Pacific, it could raise the costs to China of regional coercion.

Scenario 2

EU defense integration far surpasses expectations, while the United States to abandon its role as a leading guarantor of the liberal international order.

China might see EU defense integration as more threatening than most other situations where Washington and Brussels grow distant if the EU steps up to become the primary articulator and defender of liberal democracy worldwide.

Scenario 3

EU defense integration succeeds, but at the heavy cost of splits between Brussels, London and Washington.

China’s preferred scenario materializes – the EU increasingly acts as a regional ‘pole’ for China to play against the United States. The EU, ever more at odds with a less militarily capable NATO, focuses primarily on non-traditional security threats (counter-piracy; counter-terrorism; humanitarian assistance) and regional threats emanating from North Africa and the Middle East. For China, it presents little military challenge.

Scenario 4

EU defense integration efforts fail (PESCO in particular) and are abandoned without much damage to NATO.

China has little cause to rejoice, or worry. NATO continues to act much as it does today – providing some global goods China appreciates while binding Europe and North America in ways it perceives as fettering its global influence and worthy of occasional complaint.⁵⁰

Scenario 5

PESCO fails, simultaneously driving deep divisions between Washington, London and Brussels (especially if it founders from US, UK, or NATO opposition).

China would embrace this as a favorable outcome, with Europe and the United States increasingly at odds and NATO weakened institutionally (even if not fatally). Europe’s reduced contribution to global public goods would be a minor concern, outweighed by disdain for the US’s Cold War-origin alliance network.⁵¹

China’s analysts are paying close attention to the EU’s unfolding defense integration efforts, and the consequences for overall European integration, EU foreign and defense policy coherence, and China–EU relations. China has thus far withheld from making any formal statements for or against EU defense integration – but its observers are neither ignorant of security policy developments originating in Brussels, nor inattentive to their implications.

At present, China’s publicly available writings show scant anxiety about the possible implications of EUGS and PESCO for Beijing’s interests. In part, this may reflect the established habit of framing the EU as a partner in countering US hegemony through the rise of a ‘multipolar’ world.

However, it is possible that Beijing may seek to shape the evolution of the EU’s defense integration efforts in the course of its own security and foreign policy reviews, and future China-EU dialogues.

Should EU defense integration, and PESCO specifically, deepen trans-Atlantic divisions, Beijing may seek to encourage breakdowns in trust between Washington and Brussels, perhaps by reaching out more to the EU on security affairs.

However, if Europe manages PESCO and the EUGS as complementary to NATO, China might see reasons to attempt undermine such efforts – especially if defense integration spills over into a push for stronger EU-wide integration, or makes Brussels a more capable and active proponent of the liberal international order. Such a development would both reinforce NATO and undercut China’s hopes of Europe suited to its visions of “multi-polarity” and the “democratization of international relations.”

In the end, the world’s biggest ever, richest, strongest and technologically adept one-party communist dictatorship is inherently threatened by, and threatening to, the EU’s liberal, democratic supranational political experiment. The EU’s quest to elevate “a European way of life” is inherently at odds with the CCP’s pursuit of its own continuity in power. For the EU, successful defense integration will therefore require vigilance and a clear understanding of how China perceives its efforts to improve security and military policy coordination, as well as a plan for how to guard against any attempts by Beijing to undercut or impede it.