Miladinovic: The EU is far from joint forces, leading countries spend 50,000 dollars on the military every second

President of the Assembly of the Club of Generals and Admirals of Serbia, Milomir Miladinovic, assesses that the announcements by European officials that they will be more dedicated to defense in the future are "old stories" and he is skeptical that the EU will go beyond agreements reached within NATO.

"I was at the Command and Staff Academy back in 1988. At that time, we discussed with senior officers the formation of a 'European corps.' At that time, the EU was not in this composition and format, but Europeans were thinking about forming their own unit even though most of them were members of NATO forces. They wanted to have their own army to be a 'regular state' with territory, people, government, and even an army, but independent of NATO. However, the Americans never allowed them to do so," Miladinovic says.

The Head of EU foreign policy, Josep Borrell, stated at the beginning of March, after presenting the European Commission's plan for joint procurement of weapons, that the priority for EU members should be increased cooperation among the bloc's 27 national armies, rather than forming a unified army.

This proposal was presented at the beginning of March by the head of Italian diplomacy, Antonio Tajani.
Miladinovic questions why EU countries, NATO members, would create an army and who they would fight against independently of this Alliance.

"Personally, as a former soldier, I believe practically nothing will come out of it," Miladinovic says.

He explains that EU countries, which are also NATO members, have never been restricted from investing in their defense and spending more than two percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) as per NATO standards.

"It is the right of each European country, a NATO member, to arm itself, buy weapons, modernize, but the main line remains, they must listen to the boss, and that's the United States," Miladinovic emphasizes.

He says that he previously discussed this with the former Chief of the General Staff of the Romanian Armed Forces, who unequivocally told him that - if they had the money - they could have a million-strong army.

"When I spoke with the Chief of the General Staff of the Romanian Armed Forces, he told me that they were obligated to provide a certain level of strength and resources to NATO, and if they had the means beyond that, they could have a million-strong army for their own needs. Just as the Americans have regular armed forces but also territorial defense, or the armed forces of their states," Miladinovic says.

Commenting on the claim by the Vice-President of the European Commission, Margrethe Vestager, that it is unacceptable for EU countries to have spent $108 billion on military procurement in the first 16 months after the war in Ukraine, with nearly 80 percent of purchases coming from outside the EU, mainly from the US, Miladinovic says that major world powers are already spending $50,000 - per second.

"The leading country in terms of armaments is the USA, which allocates over $760 billion for the needs of its armed forces. The other ten countries in total have roughly the same. That's over $50,000 every second. These are huge funds, and if there were awareness among these major powers, the world would be completely different," Miladinovic says.