2023 has been a year of significant changes for the Italian defense. The Multi-Year Programmatic Document (DPP) 2023-2025 has brought a series of innovations looking to the years to come. Added to this are the developments of decisions within NATO, triggered in the recent past and which seem oriented towards a lasting impact beyond the immediate emergency.
Italy in the new NATO
If 2022 represented a watershed moment for the Atlantic Alliance with the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the adoption of the Strategic Concept in Madrid, 2023 had a fundamental moment in the top of Vilnius in July, which was also attended by Indo-Pacific partners: Australia, Japan, the Republic of Korea and New Zealand. The Lithuanian summit was characterized by a renewed and priority NATO commitment to collective deterrence and defence, a cautious attention to the Indo-Pacific and a shift of the geographical and military center of gravity towards the north-east.
In this context, President Meloni confirmed the Italy’s role in the Alliance, to whose activities and missions the country remains one of the main contributors, after the United States, both in terms of personnel and military assets. As part of the Allied missions, Italy continued to provide important support in the battlegroup NATO multinationals in Hungary, Latvia and Bulgaria – leading the NATO presence in Sofia – as well as in the operations of air policing along the east side. In total there are nine allied missions in which Italy participates, with a maximum presence of 5,200 units and funding of over 463 million euros. Of note are the 1,120 new units, 70 land vehicles and 10 air vehicles deployed in 2023 for the strengthening of the south-east area of the Alliance, followed by the 120 new units and 27 land vehicles deployed in Latvia in Enhanced Forward Presence. Furthermore, until May 2023, Italy led the NATO operation in Iraq to train local forces.
The value of this commitment was recognized by the fact that the country saw the candidacy of the current Chief of Defense Staff, Admiral Giuseppe Cavo Dragoneto be the next Chairman of the Military Committee of the Atlantic Alliance starting from January 2025. An important result which, however, must not distract attention from the fact that Italy has long been underrepresented at the levels of Secretary General (the last one is Manlio Brosio between 1964 and 1971), Deputy Secretary General and Assistant.
The commitment alongside Kyiv
On the front ofcommitment to support Ukraine, in December 2023 the eighth aid package on the Italian side was being defined, which had been anticipated by Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani during the meeting with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in October. Although the information on the sending of Italian military equipment to Ukraine is classified and exposed by the Minister of Defense only to the Parliamentary Committee for the Security of the Republic (Copasir), it is now known that Italy has supplied, among others: equipment for infantry, mortars, rocket launchers, machine guns, armored personnel carriers, towed artillery and self-propelled howitzers, anti-tank, anti-aircraft and anti-missile defense systems, and related ammunition. Added to this are civil protection devices such as generators and equipment to combat the nuclear, biological, chemical and radiological (Nbcr) threat.
However, overall, this is a much more modest contribution in terms of absolute value compared to other European countries such as Germany, the United Kingdom and Poland. There political will to support Ukraine militarily remains firm, but must come up against some limits: first of all, the resources available, with respect to which the Minister of Defense Guido Crosetto recalled that in terms of existing stocks “there is not much further space” for donations. The growing disaffection of public opinion towards a conflict that has lasted for almost two years and the persistent lack of a defense culture, which in other European countries constitutes a basis for a more structured debate on the matter, also weighs heavily.
The multi-annual programmatic document
From the internal point of view of the defense system, the aforementioned DPP proposes an “incisive renewal action” of the structure of the ministry, oriented towards a functional reorganization that looks above all at the first legal task of the armed forces, the defense of the state, with respect to crisis management and activities to support internal security. The logical consequence of this new posture of the Italian defense should be a downsizing, if not outright closure, of the operation Safe streetswhich currently involves around 5,000 Army units in tasks that more properly fall within the competence of the Carabinieri and police, damaging the preparation and readiness of the military instrument.
Overall, the relaunching the centrality of defense of the state represents a potentially innovative element compared to the last thirty years, characterized by crisis management in the absence of equal adversaries, with strong procurement implications, especially for the heavy component of the army. Another significant innovation is the institutionalization of one partnership with the United Kingdom and Japan which goes beyond the traditional European and transatlantic spheres to look structurally at the Indo-Pacific. The latter theater enriches, but does not undermine, the commitment of defense in the three traditional circles of Italian foreign policy, signaling a greater level of ambition, which will however have to be matched by adequate resources.
This article is based on the chapter “Defense policy and the role of NATO” prepared by the authors for Report on Italian foreign policy 2023 of the IAI, which will be presented at the Institute on 6 February at 5.30 pm.