ABSTRACT
The desire to preserve Europe’s strategic relevance in a changing global environment has informed the evolution of the European Union (EU) from the outset. French economist and diplomat Jean Monnet was one of the community’s chief architects and a founding father of what has become the EU. The early concept that a European Community could become a key security provider for the continent was given impetus by the demands put upon the United States during the Korean War and the impending tensions of bipolarity. The 1991 Gulf War highlighted Europe’s geopolitical irrelevance and disunity. In December 1999 the Helsinki Headline Goal set a clear target for the emerging ambitions for defence cooperation. The gap between ambition and delivery nevertheless remained a persistent feature of EU foreign and security policy-making. Europe’s advances in process and ambition from 1954 to 2009 did little to improve fundamentals.
