Nigel Farage: An EU Army to face Russia

European Parliament, Strasbourg, 11 March 2015

• Nigel Farage MEP, Leader of the UK Independence Party (UKIP), Co-President of the Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy (EFDD) Group in the European Parliament - http://www.nigelfaragemep.co.uk @Nigel_Farage
- Bluecard question: Doru-Claudian FRUNZULICĂ MEP (Romania), Socialist group (S&D)

• Debate: Preparations for the European Council meeting (19-20 March 2015)
Council and Commission statements
[2014/2941(RSP)]

Transcript:

I've been wondering why David Cameron has been running down the British armed forces and why he refused to commit to spending targets in our islands.

I think Mr Juncker has given the answer. We're going to do it at EU level. We're going to have a European army.

Now when I raised this last year with British Deputy Prime Minister Liberal Democrat Nick Clegg he said it was a dangerous fantasy to talk about a European army, an EU army.

Everyone has heard the leader of the European Liberals Guy Verhofstadt crying out for militarisation at EU level. Of course the truth is it is already happening. We already have a European Defence Agency. We have EU battle groups on active service all over the world. We already have an EU navy active against the Somali pirates, and who can forget Euro Corps here in Strasbourg last year virtually goose stepping that ghastly flag around the courtyard outside.

And of course the Lisbon treaty article 28 provides for all of this. Tony Blair was right. He said: "The European Union is not a project about peace, it's a project about power." And I think Mr Juncker is trying to seize an opportunity. We ourselves in the European Union provoked the conflict through our territorial expansionism in the Ukraine. We poked the Russian bear with a stick, and unsurprisingly Putin reacted. But this now is to be used as an opportunity to build a European army.

The opportunity is being seized. And Mr Juncker said we must convey to Russia that we are serious. Who do you think you are kidding, Mr Juncker? We do not want any part of an EU army and I doubt the rest of the peoples of Europe do either. Thank you.

[following a question from an MEP, Nigel Farage added]

We through our territorial ambitions provoked the overthrown of an albeit corrupt but democratically-elected leader in the Ukraine. We have provoked this crisis. Now, the question you ask is, "What do we do from here?"

I was in this chamber at the time when Libya was attacked. I heard the Liberals and the Greens scream, frothing at the mouth, for us to bomb Libya, for us to become militarily involved because we believed that would make things better.

My view, Sir, is that if you look at Afghanistan, if you look at Iraq, if you look at Libya, and you look at the attempt to back the rebels in Syria, many of whom have now morphed into Isis, we see that our recent foreign military interventions have made things worse not better.


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