ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on assessing how many and what kind of forces Europe might have available to meet the contingencies of the future. Among the many challenges facing the countries in the transatlantic space perhaps the most grievous flaw in the North Atlantic Alliance is that Europeans and Americans no longer share a common threat perception. The professionalization of European armies had a significant impact on two other areas. The lack of a common threat perception has had, and will continue to have, a major impact on the availability of military forces not only for their prime homeland defense role but also for the availability of military forces to carry out civil support tasks. Europeans have traditionally associated with the despised US Global War on Terrorism (GWOT), Europeans have developed the concept of Civil Security, which is a much broader construct and which allows its adherents to place priorities on non-kinetic, or even non-military, approaches to security.
