EU DECODED Will a European rush to rearm be properly funded?

Since Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine, the EU has supplied much weaponry and logistical support. But the conflict highlighted difficulties in increasing ammunition and weapons production within the bloc.

The European Commission proposed a European Defence Industry Program in March 2024, that would provide for €1.5 billion to be allocated to defence from the EU budget between 2025 and 2027.

The money should boost defence, technology and industry, but is scanty when compared with the €500 billion of investment in the sector, which experts claim is needed in the coming decade.

"Historically, most spending in this area has come from national budgets funding their national militaries. There's certainly a lot of people around here who say maybe you can make it more efficient if you clubbed together in some way at the EU level," says Jack Schickler, who covers this policy area for Euronews.

Leaders, senior officials and analysts have proposed various ideas to obtain the huge amount of funds needed. One involves repeating the effort made after the Covid-19 pandemic and returning to issuing joint debt. But frugal countries are against the idea of so-called defence Eurobonds and are thinking of alternatives.

"Financing on the European level should be done in a solidarity way. And I think that Eurobonds are one option. But I think that there are also other things we can talk about," argues Tobias Cremer, A German socialist MEP who sits on the European Parliament's subcommittee on security and defence.

"For instance, one problem is that there is a lot of private money that could actually be channelled in that direction and at the moment there are a lot of barriers for private investors that can't invest even if they wanted