Heard in mid-May by the Finance Committee in the Senate, the Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces Fabien Mandon pointed out a risk of “dropping out” vis-à-vis Germany which “plans to spend three times more than France each year”.
It is an alarm bell sounded at the highest summit of the French military hierarchy. General Fabien Mandon, Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces, shared his criticisms of France’s industrial capabilities in terms of armaments, during a hearing before the Finance Committee in the Senate on May 13, the report of which has just been published.
If he emphasizes that “our companies know how to do remarkable, very high-tech things”, he regrets that the French BITD (Industrial Technology and Defense Base) “does not know how to produce quickly and low cost”.
“But this is what we need now, while retaining areas of very high technology. We have goldsmithing, craftsmanship, while the armies need ready-to-wear. To face the level of threat we face, we need ready-to-wear, and reserve haute couture for a few key elements”, explained Fabien Mandon in front of the senators.
“For Americans, the European reference is gradually becoming Germany”
To support his remarks on “this high quality model which is not adapted, in terms of production time and cost, to deal with the volume of the threat”, the Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces recalled certain figures from recent or ongoing conflicts.
“Every evening, 200 drones attack Ukraine. In the Near and Middle East, in the first weeks of the conflict, we fired more high-tech surface-to-air defense missiles than in four years of war in Ukraine,” he underlines.
For example, he regrets that “several years may be necessary for certain munitions”. Result, according to him, France “is not there in industrial matters” and warns of a “possible dropout”. “If Germany continues at this pace, in five years, the argument that we benefit from operational experience and a certain culture will no longer hold. For the Americans, the European benchmark will gradually become Germany. The Germans plan to spend three times more than France every year. After five years, the difference will be striking,” warned Fabien Mandon.
According to a report published last February by the International Institute for Strategic Studies, Germany is the fourth country that spends the most on defense in the world, behind the United States, China and Russia. According to this ranking, France is in eighth position.
So, will the updating of the military programming law, currently debated in the Senate and which provides for an additional budgetary extension for the armies, overcome the difficulties set out by Fabien Mandon? The latter appears doubtful.
“The Prime Minister, then Minister of the Armed Forces, used the image of fitness weight, evoking a budget of around 100 billion euros per year. We are not there: we devote less than 2.5% of our GDP to defense. But that is what we are tending towards”, indicates the Chief of Staff of the Armies.
The bill should increase military spending planned for 436 billion euros by 2030. Senators The Republicans pleaded for an additional envelope of 14 billion euros, a proposal narrowly rejected this Tuesday evening. And even if the budget will be revised upwards, the model of the French armies will remain identical with no additional orders for Rafale or frigates for example. This equipment had however been requested by Sébastien Lecornu when he was Minister of the Armed Forces.
