Michele Serra calls for Europe, Elly Schlein calls for an abstract ‘common defence’. Both short-sightedly reject a concrete step towards a credible European defence: von der Leyen’s plan.

As is well known, Michele Serra has launched an appeal for a ‘pro-Europe and pro-Ukraine‘ demonstration on 15 March. A sacrosanct initiative in its intentions, to which L’Europeista rightly gave immediate support, but which now risks becoming a carnival useful only to enjoy a beautiful sunny day in Rome.

While Serra invites people to wave the blue flag with the stars in the square, he firmly opposes strengthening the Union militarily, slipping into a limpid exercise in whataboutism: “The eight hundred billion promised by von der Leyen, all at once, to the member states, have the effect of an overdose of anabolic steroids inflicted on a body that fears, or knows, that it is senile, and tries to inflate its muscles to hide its weariness. Giving an image, therefore, of profound and almost embarrassing insecurity. And throwing a lot of (public) money into the hellhole of generalised rearmament‘. Instead of addressing the thorny issue of security, Serra takes refuge in the ‘much more Europe needs‘, evading the crucial question: how to defend those European values we proclaim?

A similar political short-circuit can be observed in Elly Schlein. The PD secretary stated that ‘the EU needs common defence, not national rearmament‘. Meanwhile, Schlein rejects a real initiative that, although imperfect, represents the only concrete attempt to build a common defence. The plan presented by Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to strengthen EU defence is dismissed by Schlein as ‘not the right way’, hastily branded as a ‘rearmament race of individual states’. In practice, while von der Leyen warns that “we are living in dangerous times” and that “Europe’s security is seriously threatened”, our pacifist left replies with surreal detachment, invoking a vague common defence but rejecting any concrete steps to build it.

This ambiguous and short-sighted position betrays more electoral calculation than strategic vision. Schlein seems to want to keep his pacifist and movementist electorate together, just as Serra seems to wink at certain anti-militarist intellectual circles. The flag of ‘European values’ is waved only as long as it does not involve difficult or unpopular choices. As soon as there is talk of increasing defence budgets or investing in common armaments, the flight into rhetoric is triggered: ‘we want peace, not rearmament‘. How is one supposed to defend peace and democratic values without a military instrument to match? The hypocrisy is all here: hiding behind the lofty ideal of a united Europe so as not to have to explain why you do not want to spend a euro on common security. The objective – clear to Brussels – is ‘tospend better and together‘, rationalising resources. One suspects that Schlein’s niet to the European plan serves more to mark a political difference at home (and perhaps wink at the pacifists of the M5S and the radical left) than to really build the common defence that she says she wants.

Michele Serra and Elly Schlein are also joined by Giorgetti. The Lega Nord minister, for his part, warns that defence money must be spent prudently, because ‘to buy a drone or a supersonic missile you don’t go to the supermarket’. In short, we are faced with a bipartisan scenario that, between a sermon on values and a warning on the prudent management of resources, ends up putting the brakes on any attempt to build a credible European defence. Perhaps, rather than a ‘common defence’, what is being built here is a new alliance built on the Veltronian ‘but also’.

The von der Leyen plan aims to mobilise hundreds of billions (there is talk of EUR 800 billion within a few years adding up all the instruments). The message is clear: ‘Europe must act with determination, consolidate its defence and strengthen its strategic autonomy‘. These are not empty words: behind it is the knowledge that the geopolitical situation has become dangerous and we can no longer afford to delay.

Less whataboutism and more responsibility. For walking around Rome waving the European flag, there is always time. For rearming, no.