Considering major international challenges, what strategic

autonomy for the European Union

ln the summer of 2021, the United States' decision to evacuate its troops from

Afghanistan and then the announcement on 15 September, on the eve of the

presentation by the Commission and the High Representative of the European

Union's strategy in the lndo-Pacific, of the AUKUS pact between Australia, the

United Kingdom and the United States, illustrated the instability of our

geopolitical environment and the importance for EU countries of endowing

themselves with common instruments that serve their shared vision of

international relations and security on the continent. The significance of the

emergence of these new means is made all the greater by the overall

deterioration of the global geostrategic environment, as illustrated by the

emergence of new risks, such as the terrorist threat that France is fighting in the

Sahel alongside its European partners in the "Takuba" force, or hybrid threats,

such as Alexander Lukashenko's attempt to destabilise the Schengen area in

the summer and autumn of 2021.

The need for Member States to give themselves the means for their own

autonomy has long been recognised. One year after the start of the wars in

Yugoslavia, the foreign and defence ministers laid out the "Petersberg tasks" on

19 June 1992, which are now codified in Article 43 of the Treaty on European

Union (TEU). Under these, the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSOP)

exists to allow the Union to use civilian and military assets to carry out

disarmament, humanitarian, military advice and assistance, conflict prevention

and peacekeeping, crisis management and post-conflict stabilísation missions.

Since the first civilian operational deployment in the framework of the European

Union Police Mission (EUPM) in Bosnia and Herzegovina on 1 January 2003,

the European Union has conducted severa! civilian and military missions abroad

and is currently coordinating seven military operations in Bosnia and

Herzegovina (EUFOR "Althea"), Mali (EUTM), Central African Republic

(EUTM), Mozambique (EUTM), Somalia (EUTM), off the coast of Somalia

(EUNAVFOR "Atalanta"), and in the Mediterranean Sea (EUNAVFOR MEO

"lrini").

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