Carnegie Europe warns that European defense is digitalizing faster than the strategy that should guide it.

The European Union is accelerating investments in new defense technologies, but risks funding visible responses without a clear strategy about what kind of security it wants to build, warns a Carnegie Europe analysis signed by Raluca Csernatoni. The text argues that the future European security strategy will need to explain not only how much money Europe invests in defense, but also how it uses AI, drones, space, cyber, data, and digital infrastructure without losing political control and human responsibility.

In short

Carnegie Europe warns that the European Union is rapidly moving towards defense based on new technologies, but without a sufficiently explicit strategic plan. The analysis states that future defense will increasingly depend on AI, autonomy, drones, space, cyber, connectivity, sensors, software, and data infrastructures. Raluca Csernatoni warns that current European projects, while necessary, do not yet form a "European defense theory." A central problem is technological dependency; the analysis mentions estimates that approximately 80% of the EU's digital infrastructure is imported. The future European security strategy should link defense to digital sovereignty, responsibility, human control, and Europe's ability to decide under pressure.

The Carnegie Europe analysis starts from a change already visible in the war in Ukraine and in the European security debate: defense no longer means just troops, tanks, planes, budgets, and classic military platforms. Military capability increasingly depends on software, sensors, data, connectivity, drones, satellites, AI, and the speed at which an army can observe, decide, adapt, and strike.

Raluca Csernatoni writes that the European Union is quickly funding and organizing a shift towards defense technologies, but without a sufficiently explicit plan about the type of war, power, autonomy, and responsibility that this shift must serve. From her perspective, this will be the central test for the future European security strategy.

The stakes are not only military but also political. If European defense increasingly relies on AI, autonomy, cloud, data, connectivity, quantum, drones, and digital infrastructures, then decisions about technology become decisions about power, sovereignty, dependency, and democratic control.

The author notes that the technological foundations used in civilian life can be repurposed for defense. AI models that automate office work can be adapted for information analysis, support for decision-making, logistics, information operations, or cyber defense. This continuity between civilian and military is one of the major questions for Europe.

The problem is not that civilian technology should not be used in defense. The problem is the lack of a framework that explains how this transition is made, with what limits, and under what responsibility. Csernatoni calls this need "strategic conversion," meaning the ability to responsibly transform civilian innovation into military capabilities and to bring back to the economy the advancements generated by defense.

The analysis warns, however, that this conversion must have limits. Europe should not securitize civilian life nor turn every start-up, lab, or data space into a defense asset. This is one of the major tensions of the moment: how to use the speed of civilian innovation for security without militarizing the entire digital economy.

Csernatoni also criticizes the fragmentation of European logics. Brussels regulates civilian AI under one logic but industrializes defense under another. It protects fundamental rights in one ecosystem and accelerates military innovation in another. The lack of a strategic bridge between these worlds can produce contradictions between security objectives, industry, rights, and autonomy.

Current defense projects show, according to the analysis, the danger of advancing rapidly without an overarching vision. Initiatives regarding drones, the eastern flank, missiles, or vulnerable satellites respond to urgent needs and are necessary, but do not yet explain what kind of European defense the EU is building.

"A shield is a posture, not a strategy," writes Csernatoni. This formula synthesizes the difference between building protective tools and having a clear conception of how Europe should act, deter, resist, and maintain initiative in a future conflict.

This lack of clarity is also an institutional problem. Some European capitals remain cautious about defense projects led by the Commission, considering that decisions regarding capabilities belong to member states and NATO. Others wonder whether the EU still needs a strategy or rather the implementation of those already existing.

The analysis does not dismiss the role of the European Union in defense but argues that it needs to be defined more precisely. A serious strategy should clarify the EU's role in creating the industrial, technological, regulatory, and infrastructural conditions that make a new European defense possible.

One of the most sensitive themes is dependency. Csernatoni writes that, according to some estimates, approximately 80% of the European Union's digital infrastructure is imported, and a large part of the fundamental AI models used are non-European. A defense built on borrowed technological foundations cannot be completely strategically autonomous.

Dependency on American platforms, GPS-based systems, and data infrastructures may seem effective in a stable alliance. In a more coercive world, it can become a vulnerability. An ally in one dossier can become a competitor in another, a supplier can impose conditions, and a platform can change access.

The author does not call for technological autarky. She argues that the issue is leverage, meaning Europe's ability to continue to operate and decide when supply chains become strained, politics change, or suppliers become uncertain.

In this logic, the future European security strategy should link defense to digital sovereignty and the EuroStack debate. It should identify where sovereign computing is indispensable for defense, where European AI models are needed for sensitive functions, where guaranteed access to space and connectivity is vital, and where trusted partnerships are the best solution.

Responsibility is the other major stake. AI-based defense technologies compress the time available for human judgment. They can enhance situational awareness and resilience, but they can also produce automation bias, escalation risks, and opacity.

Csernatoni warns that Europe should not reach, without explicit political decision, a military machinery capable of war at machine speed. Before AI systems operate increasingly rapidly in command chains, Europe must decide what forms of human control, oversight, international humanitarian law, and responsibility it wants to defend.

For the uninitiated reader, the central question is simple: if future defense depends on algorithms, data, drones, and digital infrastructures, who controls these technologies, who decides when they are used, and who is responsible if they produce adverse effects?

The Carnegie Europe analysis argues that the future European security strategy will not be judged solely by the level of spending or geopolitical messages. The real measure will be whether it can link the new defense to a credible idea of power: the infrastructure necessary to operate, the capacity to keep pace with innovation, the dependencies that Europe wants to reduce, and the responsibility necessary to take ownership of technological choices.

The conclusion of the text is harsh: without these clarifications, European preparation for defense risks remaining just preparation in name. Money, drones, AI, and new industrial projects can increase the visibility of the European response, but they cannot replace a strategy that explains what Europe wants to become as a security and technology actor.

The analysis "Europe Needs a Strategy for its Turn to New Defense Tech" was published by Carnegie Europe in the Strategic Europe series and is signed by Raluca Csernatoni, a fellow at Carnegie Europe specializing in European security and defense and disruptive emerging technologies. The text discusses the connection between the new European security strategy, the defense industry, AI, digital sovereignty, technological dependencies, and democratic responsibility.