Name: Is the Franco-German engine still running? | DW News
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Benjamin Haddad is the delegate minister in charge of Europe in France.

And of course the French German engine is one of those key topics that are always being discussed in Munich.

And now with the discussion about European sovereignty getting more and more intense, it is more crucial than ever to discuss the nuts and bolts of the German French engine.

So first of all, let's look at the Americans before we get to France and Germany.

What did you make of the standing ovations here in Munich after Marco Rubio's speech?

You know, I think as Europeans we should not spend our time commenting on speeches that are made by the US and clinging to messages either of reassurance or love or whatever.

I think we should focus on what we can do for ourselves.

This was really the main focus, by the way of these last three days at the Munich Security Conference.

How can we continue the rearmament of Europe in the face of the Russian threat and increase our cooperation on defense issues?

How can we invest mass effectively into AI, into quantum, into green tech to reduce our dependencies and support our European champions?

How can you really build a European power that's able to take ownership for its own security on the world stage?

Not looking outside, but really focusing on how we can take responsibility.

But how can we take responsibility is one of those things that the Europeans have said for a couple of years now.

So in very specific terms, what do you take away from this year's msc?

Well, you know, I mean, if you look at just things we've done since last year, because I remember I was here last year as well and we were very worried that countries were going to give up on Ukraine, that maybe we were going to have a forced capitulation of Ukraine with the US and Russia negotiating a deal in 24 hours without the Europeans and the Ukrainians.

We built the coalition, the willing where we decided to bring European countries, but

also like minded like the uk, Canada, Japan or Australia to provide security guarantees to Ukraine, but

also to continue the support for the Ukrainians.

Today the bulk of support for Ukraine is provided by Europe.

In December we agreed at the European Council on a loan of 90 billion euros for the economic and the military support for Ukraine to give them visibility in the next couple of years to continue to defend themselves against Russian aggression.

We're negotiating the 20th package of sanctions to increase the pressure on the shadow fleet and the energy sector of Russia.

We're increasing our defense spending and cooperating to invest through the SAFE instrument 150 billion euros of the European Commission to build an autonomous European defence industry.

These are concrete things that have happened in the last year and the last few months.

But now it's time to accelerate, to deepen our single market, to simplify our rules and to invest where we need with public and private money to support our innovators, our entrepreneurs in all these sectors that are critical for our national security.

And support for Ukraine is something where, of course, Germany, as well as a society, has undergone a lot of changes since JD Vance's speech last year, where Germany then even changed its constitution to allow for more money to flow into defence and security.

Now, when you speak to German officials here behind the scenes, there's sort of a feeling that, yes, we are opening our coffers, we are changing our constitution, we are taking on risks.

Yeah, so first, it's true what you said about Germany, and

I think it's very important for Europe, it's very important for France.

We have other countries in Europe now that are increasing their defence spending and they're supporting Ukraine.

If you take France over the two terms of the Macron presidency, we doubled the defense budget of France just this year.

And even when we're cutting spending in certain areas, we continue to increase our.

And this has to be a generational effort.

And we also need to do it at a European level, because we know that we have a defence industry that is fragmented, where you have redundancies, where you have duplications.

We need more synergies, we need more common procurement to look at areas where today we depend from the United States and we need to invest in common, and

we need to do it with a clear principle of European preference.

Because if you say you're going to spend more on defense, you can't do it to subsidize factories in Kentucky, you can't do it to buy weapons, where you're going to have control over the use, over the exports, where you're not going to have the sovereignty over the technology.

This is why we also need really to support our European industry and continue to support Ukraine.

We have big debates coming, like the next European budget, the multiannual financial framework, where clearly we will need a high ambition on defense, on space, or on AI and procurement.

You've mentioned it is one of those areas where Germany and France are working together, together with Spain to develop the fighter jet of the future.

But of course, we all know as well that, you know, the Ideas and the analysis is the same in both countries or in all three countries even.

But it's in the execution where it gets difficult.

It's true that when you want to do ambitious things, it's difficult.

And you have to put together governments, industries, companies that have not been used to working together to provide the fighter jet for the future for Europe.

But this is something that's very important when we're talking about more synergies, more common projects, when we're talking about European defense, we need to deliver on concrete projects.

The French government is really committed to this.

We've talked to our German counterparts about moving forward and finding solutions to make FCAS a reality, to make Europe stronger.

there was a political deadline already set for the end of last year that then got pushed.

I think the key element now, we've seen progress in the last few years on different phases to, to work on the government, to work on the concrete projects through fcas, with the companies, with Dassault and Airbus.

You have two excellent companies, very innovative, and

I'm confident that we can put the different actors around the table, continue to move forward and implement this project.

Because once again, you know, when we look at the challenges that we're facing, when we look at the need to create more synergies to go to scale with concrete projects, FCAAS I think, is a good example of what we need to do.

Once again, the tanks and other such projects are important.

And the other big question that was also being debated here at this year's MSC when it comes to European security and defence and all those joint projects was the nuclear deterrence.

Now, the French President has reached out to Germany and has said, okay, let's discuss this.

The German Chancellor confirmed on the stage, even here when he addressed the audience, that these talks are underway.

How useful is that that Europeans talk about nuclear deterrence building together?

Isn't that a risk of alienating the Americans?

So first, I think what's really important is that for a long time France has said that Europeans need to take more ownership for their security.

And you know, we have, we've always had an independent nuclear deterrent in France and we've always said for a long time now.

And Jacques Chirac, even when he was president, said in his speech that there was a European dimension to our vital interests.

And, of course, the security of our neighbors is a vital interest for France.

The president and the chancellor said it in the last few days.

And the president will have more to say in the coming weeks in his speech about these issues.

But I think, really, this is an important strategic conversation that we're having right now in Europe.

So no chance about the details in Mr. Macron's speech from you?

But you will hear the president in the coming weeks will have more to say.