The EU needs an effective common arms export policy by Sophia Besch and Beth Oppenheim
The EU’s strategic interests and credibility are harmed by its ineffective and incoherent approach to arms export policy. The EU is the world’s second largest arms exporter, behind the US. Member-states’ combined arms exports made up 27 per cent of the global total in 2014-18, compared with 36 per cent for the US. On paper the Union has a common arms export policy. EU member-states have agreed to uphold “high common standards” for transfers of conventional arms, through the international Arms Trade Treaty and the EU Common Position on Arms Export Controls. The legally binding Common Position sets out eight criteria against which member-states must test export licences, including respect for human rights and international humanitarian law in the destination country.
protect allies and friendly states; and strengthen Europe’s defence industry.
Member-states are free to decide how they implement the Common Position, however, and there is no EU mechanism to sanction noncompliance. In practice, therefore, member-states operate their own, conflicting, national policies, and misapply the criteria in their export decisions, which are often political, or industry-driven.
By restricting arms supplies, the EU can attempt to change a state’s behaviour. Arms embargoes can constrain aggressive behaviour by depriving a country of military resources. Arms export restrictions can also signal condemnation of human rights abuses or violations of international humanitarian law. But the impact of arms embargoes should not be overstated. On their own, they are ineffective in changing state behaviour, and are particularly poor at preventing human rights abuses and crackdowns on democracy. The most effective arms embargoes are usually accompanied by additional economic sanctions, which hit countries far harder.
Inconsistent implementation of the Common Position stops the EU using arms exports to pursue its foreign and security policy objectives. A genuinely common policy would stop EU weapons being used to undermine regional stability or violate international humanitarian and human rights law; promote regional stability;
By supplying arms, the EU can help its allies and partners maintain technological parity with, or superiority over, shared adversaries; and make it easier to conduct joint operations with its partners. Europeans sometimes export to strategic partners or allies in crisis-prone regions in the hope of contributing to regional stability – though this is a risky strategy that should always form part of a comprehensive support programme, including training and educating security forces about how to use the arms in line with international law.