La France face au défi de la planification de défense Européenne (1989-2001)

France and the challenge of European defence planning (1989-2001)

Abstract

This article deals with France’s policy vis-à-vis multinational defense planning in, and for Europe, as one of the key challenges of European Defense and Security Policy since the end of the Cold War. France has consistently tried to develop an autonomous EU crisis management’s capability, which required defense planning mechanisms, for which France explored a great variety of solutions in both NATO and EU frameworks. Retracing this quest for autonomy helps us to explain the subtle mix of dogmatism and pragmatism that has shaped French’s Europe puissance, and nowadays the strategic autonomy, and to measure the degree of continuity and change in France’s European defense policy thirty years after Maastricht.