Why Europe Is Rearming? – Analysis – Eurasia Review

Why Europe Is Rearming? – Analysis  Eurasia Review

For decades after 1945, Europe tried to make war unthinkable through trade, shared institutions and democratic habit. Political scientists even gave the For decades after 1945, Europe tried to make war unthinkable through trade, shared institutions and democratic habit. Political scientists even gave the result a name: a “security community,” in Karl Deutsch’s phrase, where states stop imagining war among themselves. (1) Now the continent is rearming, and fast. The post-Cold War “peace dividend” is gone. Governments from Scandinavia to Poland have reached the same uncomfortable conclusion: The surest way to avoid a continental war is to look ready to fight one. International relations theory has a much older worry about that logic, and it deserves a re-reading of the situation.

The Russia-Ukraine war, which began in 2022, explains most of the shift. European capitals no longer read the conflict as a border dispute. They read it as an attack on the security order the continent has depended on since 1991. The war also has shown what a large conflict consumes. Drones and cyber operations matter, but attrition dominates the fighting: shells, spare parts, long supply lines and a steady supply of soldiers. Europe’s defense industry, allowed to shrink for 30 years, could not keep pace, and governments noticed. The budgets show the change. EU members spent €418 billion on