FROM OUR CORRESPONDENT
BRUSSELS – In the now declaimed attempt to pursue greater sovereignty at EU level, the European Commission has presented new strategies in the field of defense and space. Among other things, the executive proposes to create a space communication network, which is secure, encrypted and independent. Behind the initiative, there is a filigree desire to use space as a picklock to encourage greater cooperation in defense between member countries.
In a press conference in Strasbourg, French industry commissioner Thierry Breton argued that space is now “a subject of controversy”. He explained that there are “daily conflicts” in an area that has suddenly become the subject of national, if not military, contention. “We must – he explained – protect our cyber borders (…) In this field too, Europe must have its own logic, its own philosophy, and its own means”.
In this sense, Brussels intends to build a network that guarantees spatial connectivity to governments, businesses and individuals through satellites. The goal is to complete the work by 2027. The project has a value of € 6 billion, of which € 2.4 billion comes from the EU budget. The initiative comes as governments are negotiating a new strategic compass to be published in March and political tensions are putting peace in Eastern Europe at risk.
Still on the space front, the European Commission wants to develop a shared management of space at European level, naturally in collaboration with the other space powers (Space Traffic Management, in English). Some figures leave you astonished. Currently 11,800 satellites circulate around the earth, of which 4,550 are still operational. Over the next ten years, Commissioner Breton said yesterday, another 20,000 satellites will be launched.
In the space field, the Twenty-seven now act as a whole. The Galileo and Copernicus programs are a Community success. On the other hand, space is such that a single European country can do little. In this sense, the attempt is to use space as a lever to encourage collaboration in defense, a collaboration that is still too modest. “NATO cannot defend us in space and in the cyber domain,” Commissioner Breton noted yesterday. From now on, the politician has said he wants the spatial dimension to be dual, that is civil and military.