In the midst of the current economic crisis, the contradictions between the imperialists continue to intensify. One expression of this is the increasing militarization in various countries, including the countries of the European Union. The latter is now developing plans to boost its munitions production.
On this year's third of May, it was announced that the EU Commission has prepared and presented a draft law dealing with how to further increase the production of ammunition in the EU. The plans are to provide European defense companies with a one-billion-euro financial injection for the expansion of ammunition production. Under the proposal, funds of up to 500 million euros would be made available from the EU budget by mid-2025. A further 500 million euros is to come from EU member states as co-financing. In addition, the law is intended to facilitate access to funding for EU companies in the ammunition and missile sector and to ensure better monitoring of supply chains in this area.
The plan was announced by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen at a meeting with the Czech President the night before the announcement. She spoke mainly about the importance of producing more ammunition and, above all, producing it faster. "It's all about speed, speed, speed and increasing the production of ammunition now...," von der Leyen said. EU Industry Commissioner Thierry Breton, who introduced the proposal, said he was confident that production capacity in Europe could be increased to one million rounds per year within 12 months.
In the justification for this bill, there is a lot of talk about supporting Ukraine, as this is intended to provide more ammunition for the Ukrainian Army. Thus, von der Leyen said:
"Europe is intensifying its support in three ways. First, Member States will provide additional ammunition from their existing stocks and provide new funding from the European Peace Facility of 1 billion euros. Second, we will work with Member States to procure more ammunition for Ukraine, for which we are providing an additional 1 billion euros. And today we are implementing the third goal. We will ramp up and accelerate defense industrial production of munitions in Europe."
The imperialists in the EU, first and foremost Germany and France, want to use the war for their own interests and further deepen Ukraine's dependence on them. But alongside this, the aim is also to increase the military capabilities of EU countries in general. Accordingly, von der Leyen said:
"This will help provide more ammunition for Ukraine to defend its citizens, and it will also strengthen our European defense capabilities. Together with Member States, we will mobilize an additional €1 billion to increase capabilities across Europe. This is a crucial part of Europe's strategic capability to defend its interests and values, and to help keep the peace on our continent
EU Industry Commissioner Breton also said that it is necessary to revitalize the industrial base for munitions production in Europe to adapt it to the needs of a high-intensity conflict. Furthermore, he talked about the need for European industry to now switch to "war economy mode" in matters of defense.
It is obviously clear that all the politicians' talk about the "importance of keeping the peace" through so-called "defense" is a bad joke. How peace-loving the imperialists in Western Europe are we could all see well during the NATO war against Yugoslavia. Whenever the imperialists start wars they either talk about the so-called human rights and/or about the fact that all their measures only serve the defense. Russian imperialism, for example, described its war of aggression against Ukraine as a measure of defense, against encirclement by US-led NATO. NATO itself also portrayed its eastward expansion and encirclement of Russia as necessary measures for defense. We see that both say that the reasons for their actions are only self-defense. In fact, Russia's disgusting war of aggression is a reaction to NATO's encirclement and an attempt to break it, but the point being made is that all imperialists, whenever they speak of defending peace, are in fact carrying out aggression and warmongering against the peoples.
The plan to produce more and faster ammunition, like many other measures, is part of the ever-increasing militarization that we can see in many countries. The imperialists are preparing themselves more and more to carry out their contradictions also armed and at the expense of the peoples and the working class. Just now, while poverty is rising everywhere, they want to change to a "war economy" and spend more and more money on armament and war instead of helping the poor people. The rearmament serves only the rulers and it must and will be rejected and fought by the peoples.
