The Economist March 19th 2022 21
BritainTheJointExpeditionaryForceNATO-lite
O
n the nightof March 14th, while Rus
sian forces were pounding Ukrainian
cities, six leaders and other representa
tives of the Joint Expeditionary Force (jef),
a Britishled coalition of ten northern
European countries, gathered for the first
time at Chequers, the country house of
Britain’s prime minister. They put their
phones away for security, sat down to din
ner and set to work. “We agreed that Putin
must not succeed in this venture,” Boris
Johnson told The Economistthe next day.
They agreed to “coordinate, supply and
fund” more arms and other equipment re
quested by Ukraine. And they declared that
jef, through exercises and “forward de
fence”, would seek to deter further Russian
aggression—including provocations out
side Ukraine that might stymie nato or fall
under its threshold.
jef, largely unknown outside defence
circles, was established a decade ago as a
highreadiness force focused on the High
North, North Atlantic and Baltic Sea regions (see map on next page for its mem
bers). Unlike nato, it does not need inter
nal consensus to deploy troops in a crisis:
Britain, the “framework” nation, could
launch operations with one or more part
ners. As one British officer puts it: “The jef
can act while nato is thinking.”
That makes it especially useful in mur
ky circumstances. “It’s there to respond
flexibly to all sorts of contingencies, may
be [those] that fall short of an Article Five
threshold,” says Mr Johnson, referring to
nato’s collectivedefence clause. jef mat
ters because, although Article Five covers
“armed attack”, it is unclear whether lower
level or ambiguous provocations, such as
the unmarked Russian soldiers who seized
Crimea from Ukraine in 2014, would meet
the threshold. jef is therefore a “valuable
complement” to nato, says Martin Hurt of
icds, a defence thinktank in Estonia. In
the case of an attack in northern Europe, he
says, jef, alongside American forces, has
the potential to become a first responder.jef has also become an important dip
lomatic and military instrument in re
sponding to Russia’s war in Ukraine. Brit
ish officials say that only a few weeks ago a
London summit built around the force
would have been unthinkable. jef “con
sists of the countries that were fastest off
the blocks, with us, in sending direct mili
tary assistance to Ukraine,” Mr Johnson
points out. Nine out of ten members are
now supplying weapons (Iceland, which
lacks a standing army, is the exception).
“What we agreed today was to make sure
that we're not all supplying the same
thing,” says Mr Johnson.All for one
jef’s growing prominence reflects wider
trends in European security. Instead of re
lying on nato, countries are hedging their
bets and diversifying with a dizzying array
of coalitions, blocs and groupings, from
the Frenchled European Intervention Ini
tiative to the European Union’s Permanent
Structured Cooperation, or pesco. In Sep
tember France signed a defence pact with
Greece. Britain, Poland and Ukraine agreed
on a trilateral security pact in February.
jef’s composition is noteworthy because it
includes three countries that are members
of nato but not the eu (Britain, Iceland and
Norway) and two that are members of the
eu but not nato (Finland and Sweden).
For Europeans, much of this is aboutK YIV AND LONDON
Boris Johnson tells The Economistabout the ten-country coalition against Russia→Alsointhissection
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