EU to stress-test NATO alternative

The European Union will test its ability to defend itself without nato, Politico reported on April 17. The EU’s chief diplomat, Kaja Kallas, will hold an exercise in the EU’s Political and Security Committee to test how the union’s mutual defense clause could work in practice on the political level. The 2007 Treaty of Lisbon established that if any member state is attacked, other members must assist it “by all the means in their power,” an equivalent provision to Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty. The timing of this exercise is notable because it occurs as confidence in nato is dying.