The Nordic Countries and the European Security and Defence Policy

140 NATIONAL DEFENCE AND EUROPEAN COOPERATIONwith the EDA and with the embryonic links it entails to the Commission’s workon security research and defence industrial market policy. These will be criticalin meeting underlying structural challenges posed by national defence policyand planning and defence industrial relations in Europe.The success of the member states in developing capability targets and meetingoperational demands, as well as in developing innovative concepts andplanning arrangements, has so far been dependent on sustained political will.When that political will waned, as during the Iraq crisis, criticism of the ESDPwelled up again and the capability-development process stalled. The tremendouspositive will that has been shown since then to produce an agreed EuropeanSecurity Strategy, and to come to an agreement on defence clauses in theConstitutional Treaty, should be acknowledged as important steps in gettingEurope back on track: to focus on collective security ambitions and on the rolewhich military crisis management might have in supporting such policies.