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London: The UK MoD could not afford not to get involved in the new Euro Arms Agency at the ground floor; but many observers are convinced the initiative will lead nowhere.
In November 1996, British defence officials put aside their Euro-sceptic leanings and signed two agreements, both of which, in principle, have locked the UK into a new era of European defence procurement.
On 12 November, the UK signed a memorandum of understanding for the establishment of a Quadrilateral Armaments Agency with France, Germany and Italy. This is an expanded version of the former Franco-German Arms Agency, the body that, for a while at least, symbolised the special relationship in defence cooperation forged between those two countries. The second joint armaments structure, the Western European Armaments Organisation, was brought into being a week later. This off-shoot of the Western European Union (WEU), backed by 13 nations, is supposed to place a greater emphasis on research than procurement, although many see it as a precursor to a massive new arms buying agency, eventually embracing the whole of Europe.
Announcing the signing of the MoU for the Quadrilateral Agency, UK defence procurement minister James Arbuthnot said: "The UK is now fully involved, on an equal basis, in the Agency's formation, operation and subsequent development. This important initiative will lead to a more efficient, effective approach to the management of collaborative defence programmes."
Efficient? Effective? At a time when several large European collaborative programmes are receiving criticism for being too unwieldy, one seasoned UK industry observer commented that the Continent needs more procurement bureaucracy "like a hole in the head."
Eurofighter example
The four-nation Eurofighter consortium, for example, has been attacked for its at times cumbersome handling of the EF 2000 programme. Last year, British Aerospace admitted that the complex setup of the Eurofighter organization had been behind a number of cost-control and technology problems associated with the fighter -- problems that were only solved by the kind of lean management troubleshooting techniques currently de rigueur in large US aerospace companies and some British ones. If...