CRISIS over Westland deseltine's resignation orced out into the open of the key opments in European British politics. ALAN LTINE's spectacular resighas flushed out the close but between European ry, the military, and growing In these field. Many people how the military-industrial lex dominates Washington.
its shadowy role in Europe. FREEMAN reports.
Ginnockite left see the EEC as a gressive alternative to US nuclear claim that curopean holds the key, not just lo proY but to peace — so they turn a eye to its military implications. a these champions of a middle of find themselves virtually in the camp as Britain's answer 1o RamTarzan Heseltine himself. asking why. se EEC is not Europe. It is an arI creation which unites the main wist nations of Western Europe. cent moves lowards grealer unit! integration among these powers been designed 1o give a capitalist ith the USA - and military pro*from the USSR. Unfortunately ism only spcaks one language .competition is concerned: the age of force. European unity, and arging of a more united European apparatus, ted. estland illustrates this. per cent of Westland's work is the This is no accident.
world's" market 01 33,00 piers is accounted for by the US 27 market alone. In Europe 4000 ry helicopters are required every Helicopiers, as George Orwell stea, are indispensable to modern те. le European consortium offers Westland guaranteed sales four European governments for helicopter projects. These are:
medium-weight NH90 NATO pter currently under study by BriFrance, Wesi Germany, Italy and etherlands.
lightweight battlefield pter which would merge i wo currojects — a Franco-German proPAH2 Anglo-Italian pment. = military development naval utility pier, the fruit oration berween Westlands and Augusta. Failure 1o develop the ry application of this helicopier is lered one of the main reasons for and's present difficulties. ch guarantees, given the present f the 'free' markel, can only be by governments, aments can only give fees because of the increasingly military coordination they - and 'ine — have promoted. us, as soon as the threat of a US ver became clear, Heseltine sumI a meeting, which took place on ovember 1985, between the na armaments directors of Britain, , Germany and Italy. The Euroconsortium was born from the ration they made. This declaraa turn was in line with a policy FREEMAN looks at the European military integration that lie behind Michael Heseltine's EEC backers. DICK CARTER looks at how major sections they had operated since 1978 was to cover their needs 'solely from helicopters built in Europe.' Broad agreements in this type were being concluded as early as 1978 and before. Joint civilian projects such as the European Airbus have gone hand in hand with joint military ones such as the European fighter project. The interrelation between civilain and military projects is obvious.
three years that European governments began creating political institutions to oversee and coordinate this collaboration. The fact that Heseltine felt moved 10 call a meeting of defence ministers discuss the fate of a small bankrupt heliconter firm. these institutions are taken.
The framework for such bodies is It is not outside NATO. all io break with Reagan's military diplomacy: it is to compete with it on more equal ierms. absolutely clear on Spain, which joins the EEC his month, has been under extraordinary pressure 10 join NATO, and it has more or less been spelt out that this is the price must be paid economic integration Therein lies the folly of any notion that alternative Defence Eighty Nearly The main bodies which coordinate Europe's defence activities are NATO bodies. In mid-1984 the EEC member states revived a largely defunct NATO body, the Independent European Programme Group, which specifically excluaca ine UDA and autumn this body identified six specific claims projects for collaboration on weapons development.
At the same time a second moribund body, the Union, was revived to assist the European which was first outlined as a policy goal policy.
which principle of matter technological However, it is only in the last two or four nations, shows how seriously True The idea is not at Heseltine has been this Moreover of their for any real into the defence represents a soft militarisation diture is the Canada. Last Defence member states in an objective ensure of the left became lined up behind Heseltine - and the as well as these long term considerations. Of these the most important is the present economic situation of the EEĆ member states.
As Reagan's Star Wars has shown, keeping up the arms race is not just a building bigger guns. maments are always in the vanguard of development. Virtually every area of hi-tech research targetted by the Eureka' project planned by the EEC states has military applications. and the Eureka planners know full well that in order to build an independent arms capacity they have to stay ahead in these hi-tech areas. To guide missiles you need genetic engineering and a sophisticated chemical industry. To put neea space rockets. And so on.
But the converse is also true. In an climate in which private capital is unable or unwilling to invest in basic research, the only way that capitalist governments can keep their economies afloat, let alone siay ahead is to use ine military machine to bribe and stimulate terference, which drives them to a frenzy when concerns health, education, housing or any ordinary people's needs, just melts away when the magic word 'defence' - that is, war - is mentioned.
governments have been forced to come to terms with the economic consequences of Reagan's drive. Military one side of government spending which has not been cut by Reagan. On the contrary it is now the highest percentage of government exKorean wal.
Military spending, at the same time that social spending has been cut to the bone. has been the investment pump which reflated the US economy. In this sense, as well as socially, the capitalist world has gone back to the 30s. The of its hope for economic survival. freeze Westland out of the five nation collaboration to produce the battlefield helicopter, the NH90 military transport helicopter and an Augusta model - all tipped by Heseltine as the core of the Manufacturers Association added his name to the defenders of the European In an effort to block the Sikorsky offer, helicopter operator Alan Bristow put money behind his mouth with a f5 million swoop on the stock exchange to nie cenar legion in Indochina, for which he won the Croix de Guerre. This is a fitting reminder that, whoever produces the helicopters, they will be used to crush lineration struggles across the world ing people owe Kinnock and Gill no ment that the only enemy is American had a sense of urgency, to control the unions, to bring down inflation, to win the Falklands war. It is less acceptable if the momentum is seen to be 11 January remarked: "These muffs ment is no longer clear about its own set of objectives for the rest of this can manufacture gun platforms here and ship them legally to South Africa. That's why Sikorsky wants Westland and why Thatcher is keen to secure If this is true, than all the more reason to step up the campaign for sanctions against apartheid South Africa. £500,000 house in London and a home in Cornwall, His Oxford hire house stands on land, with a lake The whole complex estimated at f2 million. Last year he forked out £350,000 for another farm in tne area and us puousning con pany paid f500,000 for a farm a mile away from his home.
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consequences of support for a 'European' military