The EU’s response to the crisis in Israel exposes its limits
Whose foreign policy is it anyway?
![Ursula von der Leyen, Emmanuel Macron and Olaf Scholz look on in dismay as a EU ceremonial trumpeter blows a discordant note against the backdrop of an ominous sky with smoke and explosions](https://www.economist.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=1424,quality=80,format=auto/content-assets/images/20231021_EUD000.jpg)
Nothing screams “great power” like an aircraft-carrier. And so on October 10th Thierry Breton, the European commissioner hailing from France, raised the idea of the EU availing itself of such a seafaring airbase. Alas, even before the merits of a floating jet-launcher for a bloc with neither navy nor air force could be considered, the EU’s geopolitical ambitions fared as poorly as a plane lurching off the deck and into the drink. In the days around Mr Breton’s flight of fancy, a fumbled response to the terrorist attacks in Israel on October 7th left Europe looking muddled. A union that had found its foreign-policy voice over Ukraine has rediscovered its penchant for cacophony. A bout of chaotic diplomacy and internal squabbling has set back the cause of a “geopolitical EU” to match China and America.
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This article appeared in the Europe section of the print edition under the headline “Back to cacophony”
Europe October 21st 2023
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