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Lawmakers echoed the concerns of NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg, who warned in an interview with the Telegraph over the weekend that a European military force could divert scarce resources from the US-led alliance.
Hambel said that proposals to create parallel military structures and duplicate the command structure were “ridiculous.” He argued that NATO has proved to be efficient over time and Europe needed to have more leverage within it.
“We must concentrate on NATO’s basic defence treaty and have more efficient European voices in it. It is not the mission of NATO or of a potential European force to interfere worldwide,” he argued.
Thierry Mariani, a French member of the European Parliament from Marine Le Pen’s National Rally, said that a unified European force would ultimately become a money drain and dilute France’s influence in Europe as the only capable national army, effectively depriving it of the “last small point of pre-eminence” over Germany.
“This idea does not hold water at all. France is the only country in the EU that has nuclear weapons. France sits on the UN Security Council. To enter a European intervention force would be to dissolve the French Defence. It would create a German-dominated Europe,” he said./Sputniknews
