Europe’s Defence Coalitions Need Someone to Own the Outcome

Coalitions Create an Accountability Problem

At its October meeting, the European Council urged member states to step up capability coalitions and joint defence projects. That is the right direction. Europe cannot wait for a single federal defence structure before acting.

Europe’s defence capacity is inevitably fragmented. A military operation may depend on a French port, a German railway, a Polish electricity network, privately operated telecommunications and capabilities supplied by countries outside the EU.

They do not need a common owner. But somebody must be responsible for whether the system works when it is needed.

Defence remains largely national. Ports, railways, electricity networks, airports, telecommunications, industrial sites and logistics facilities sit under different owners, regulators and levels of government. The UK and Norway are outside the EU, while NATO includes the US. No institution owns the complete system.

Common capacity therefore cannot depend on common ownership. What matters is whether the different components can produce the required effect, at the required time and for the required duration.

Military capability already works this way. Maritime capacity is a system of ships, surveillance, weapons, crews, ammunition, maintenance, communications, infrastructure, intelligence and logistics. Possessing the components somewhere is of little use if they cannot operate together when required.

The same logic should apply across borders.

Europe is unlikely to create a single institution responsible for every strategic capability. Waiting for one risks making institutional perfection an excuse for inaction.

A more practical approach would start with a small group of willing countries and a limited number of capabilities: military mobility, logistics, air and missile defence, surveillance, communications, industrial sustainment or energy resilience.

For each capability, the starting point should be the result that countries need to produce.

What capacity already exists? Who controls it? Which critical components are nationally available, jointly provided or contractually assured? Which depend on an ally outside the group? Where are the bottlenecks, and who is responsible for closing them before a crisis?

A Lead Integrator, Not a Super-Owner

For each agreed capability, participating countries should designate one country or body as lead integrator. It would not need to own the underlying assets. Its responsibility would be to understand the complete delivery chain, expose unresolved dependencies, monitor readiness and report whether the required outcome can actually be produced.

That is different from coordination. Europe already has plenty of coordination. Accountability means somebody must answer for the result.

This would also expose how much defence capacity sits outside defence ministries.

Moving forces depends on ports, railways, roads and bridges. Sustaining them requires energy, communications, warehouses, maintenance facilities and industrial production. Many of these assets are publicly owned or controlled for civilian or commercial purposes by institutions with little reason to regard themselves as part of a defence system.

Their ownership need not change. Their contribution to strategic capacity needs to become visible.

A railway remains a railway. A port remains a commercial enterprise. An electricity grid continues to serve households and industry. But if defence plans depend on any of them, governments need to know what capacity is available, what can fail, how quickly it can be restored and who is responsible for ensuring that it works.

That is the difference between an inventory of assets and a functioning system.

A Defence Capacity Statement could provide the common discipline: defining the required effect, existing usable capacity, critical dependencies, accountable owners and evidence that the outcome can actually be delivered.

Start Small

The Nordic and Baltic countries offer one natural place to test the approach. Geography, shared security concerns and existing cooperation already create incentives to think across national boundaries. One or two capabilities could be mapped from the required outcome backwards, exposing the complete delivery chain across military and civilian institutions.

Other coalitions could form around different geographies and capabilities.

The institutional form matters less than the discipline.

Outcome first. Then visibility, control and accountability. Finance follows the capacity requirement.

Governments frequently reverse that sequence. Money is announced, programmes are created and existing institutional responsibilities are defended before anyone establishes whether the pieces form a functioning system.

That is how a continent can spend more while remaining dependent.

Fragmented ownership is inevitable. Failure begins when the final outcome belongs to nobody.

A more balanced transatlantic alliance requires European countries to understand what they can generate and sustain themselves, what they depend on others to provide and where those dependencies create unacceptable risk.

Europe does not need to resolve every constitutional question before beginning. A handful of countries, a handful of capabilities and a common method are enough to start.

The question is no longer who owns every component.

It is who owns the outcome.

© Dag Detter, 2026, published by RUSI with permission of the author.

The views expressed in this Commentary are the author's, and do not represent those of RUSI or any other institution.

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