Plans for the United Kingdom to re-establish formal foreign and security ties with the European Union, frozen during negotiations on a trade agreement, can never be revived, as the UK’s foreign policy focuses on bilateral ties in Europe and the development of new alliances in the Indo-Pacific and the Middle East.
The freeze marks a little-discussed reversal of thought in Theresa May’s day, when the political statement at the time of Britain’s withdrawal spoke of negotiating deep co-operation between Britain and the EU.
May herself said at the 2018 Munich security conference: “Europe’s security is our security, and the United Kingdom is unconditionally committed to maintaining it. The challenge for all of us today is to find a way to work together, through a deep and special partnership between the UK and the EU, to preserve the cooperation we have built and move forward to deal with evolving threats. that we face together. “
The EU has even published proposals on how this cooperation could work in detail, but the UK has not taken up the ideas.
The change in Britain since the era has not been formally announced by both sides, and its implications have been little discussed.
For the EU, while trying to integrate its own foreign policy, it must fear that the UK could undermine its foreign policy rules, in the same way that it fears the UK will diverge over trade standards. But British diplomats believe that post-Brexit Britain has already demonstrated independence of judgment and leg buoyancy, compared to the EU, where difficult decisions require all 27 EU foreign ministers to agree. . The disadvantages of avoiding EU foreign policy are undetectable to conservative Eurosceptics.
So in the last year, the UK has cooperated with the EU on a strictly ad-hoc basis, often following its own path on issues such as sanctions. For example, in the case of Belarus, the United Kingdom (along with Canada) issued sanctions against the Minsk regime before the EU (and the US) agreed on their packages. The EU and the US appeared to have coordinated their measures, but EU measures were then blocked and delayed by Cyprus, threatening a veto.
Instead, the response to the poisoning of Russian dissident Alexei Navalny led to close coordination by the EU and the UK, following the 2018 Skripal case plan.
In the case of gas drilling in Turkey in the eastern Mediterranean, the EU has imposed some sanctions and may impose more in March, while the United Kingdom has given up, unwilling to offend either party. As France and Turkey exchanged insults and Germany mediated, the UK was free to move away from the EU, probably considering the trade deal it was seeking with Turkey.
In Libya, where Britain played a key role in the 2011 revolution, it recently remained on the sidelines, following the EU’s railroad on Turkish violations of the UN arms embargo and leaving the EU in the hands of police crossing the Mediterranean to Spain and Italy. On some issues, last year showed an advantage in diplomatic discretion.
The main European forum in which the UK is active remains E3 – Germany, France and the UK. Here, at least in public, Europe’s major powers have kept pace with the Iranian nuclear deal, resisting pressure from the United States to declare the agreement violated and to introduce Iranian non-compliance into the dispute settlement mechanism, a means by which the agreement could be declared dead.
E3 also coordinated more and more on Iranian human rights violations, and at the level of political director discussed wider issues, including Russia. But in Ukraine, only the United Kingdom offered a political and defense partnership with Kiev.
In general, EU plans for institutionalized cooperation appear dead or at least dormant. Rosa Balfour, director of Carnegie Europe, in a pamphlet from the foreign policy center, suggests: “The EU must give up, for the time being, the hope that the UK will participate in any institutionalized arrangement. The foreign policy of the British government is ideologically driven; EU action is strongly process-based. The gap between the two is one of the causes of Brexit. “
British diplomats look at the foreign policy agenda of Josep Borrell, the EU’s representative for foreign affairs and security policy, and withdraw. His call for a majority vote on foreign policy through “constructive abstention” and for the EU to use the language of power is not attractive to Britain. Similarly, for British eyes, the contrast between Emmanuel Macron’s call for a stronger united Europe and the unilateral elaboration of French foreign policy reveals the falsity of integrated foreign policy.
In reality, EU foreign policy too often looked like a coalition of those who did not want to. But some policymakers say the EU-UK foreign policy debate will be revived, if only because of three deep clearing forces.
The mundane reality may lead Britain to realize that the impact of its foreign policy is multiplied if it works with the EU. The Biden administration would also prefer the UK not to be independent if it weakens the EU. Finally, the EU will slowly integrate its defense arm and has already established a way in which third parties, such as the United Kingdom, could participate.
Ian Bond, at the Center for European Reform, can see three ways in which the UK and the EU could formally collaborate: in the exchange and protection of classified information, in the participation of British personnel in defense missions and operations through the European Defense Agency.
But the dust may need to be resolved from the full trade talks and a blow from Biden for those talks to begin.