Europe’s defence needs more creative thinkers than bullets by Marja Heikkinen

Europe does not need another tank. We’re drowning in them. If there were a Eurovision contest for who owns the most outdated, oversized steel beasts, we’d have a three-way tie before the opening act even finished singing. What Europe truly needs and what the war in Ukraine has painfully reminded us, is not more bullets, but more brains. Not more hardware, but more hard thinking. Not more troops marching, but more ideas walking into the room with courage.

The tragedy unfolding in Ukraine has laid bare the strengths and limitations of modern European defence. Yes, the tanks rolled, the missiles flew, and the troops marched. But what truly tipped the scale wasn’t just firepower, it was strategy, coordination, intelligence, and a deep well of national morale paired with information warfare precision. In other words, it was creativity and strategic thinking that disrupted a seemingly superior force. And yet, what are European policymakers doing? Ordering another shipment of helicopters. It’s a bit like trying to win a chess match by ordering more pawns from Amazon.

Europe has an almost romantic obsession with military procurement. We measure our “readiness” by how many fighter jets are parked on the tarmac or how many battalions we can deploy in 48 hours. But war, especially modern war, is no longer won by quantity alone. If that were the case, Russia would have turned Ukraine into a Soviet-themed theme park by spring 2022. But here we are, years later, with a defiant Kyiv, a bruised Kremlin, and a thoroughly confused European defence narrative still stuck in the Cold War.

Our adversaries are not limited to tanks and borders. They’re in our networks, our elections, our energy systems. Yet we keep spending as if they’re coming across the Ardennes in formation. Buying more tanks to fight 21st-century threats is like training for cybercrime by practicing your fencing skills. Noble, but useless.

What Europe desperately lacks is not firepower, but foresight. Where is our strategic doctrine for hybrid warfare? Where is our psychological defence infrastructure? Where are our counter-disinformation task forces with the same budget and swagger as a fighter wing? Where are the think tanks with teeth, not just writing papers, but influencing policy?

Instead of investing in multilingual hackers, AI capabilities, and public resilience, we’re investing in… more uniforms. It’s as if the Maginot Line had a PR team that’s still going strong.

The war in Ukraine demonstrated the potency of smart defence, how a smaller force, fueled by strategic thinking and international collaboration, can resist and even repel a larger aggressor. Ukrainian resistance wasn’t just built on Javelins; it was built on memes, mobile apps tracking enemy units, and a decentralized, nimble command structure. It was guerrilla warfare meets Google Docs.

Now let’s address the European elephant in the room: NATO. Yes, it's vital. Yes, it has served as a protective umbrella for decades. But let’s not confuse alliance with strategy. Europe must stop thinking of NATO as a substitute for its own thinking. Strategy cannot be subcontracted.

European defence policy often resembles a group project where everyone assumes someone else is doing the work, usually the Americans. But what happens when the Americans are distracted or disinterested? We’ve had two decades of warnings. Trump wasn’t a one-off event; he was a neon warning sign wearing a red tie.

Still, our response? Let’s form another joint command council and hold another conference in Brussels, with matching folders and croissants. Strategic thinking, you see, is often smothered by procedural rituals. You can’t brainstorm when you're stuck in a PowerPoint purgatory.

So what would a truly modern European defence strategy look like?

- Education over Armament: Fund universities and institutions that produce not just engineers but ethical hackers, cultural analysts, strategic planners, and digital warriors. Brains win wars before they start.

- Narrative Control: Invest in public communication strategies to counter disinformation. If Russia is playing 4D chess online, Europe is still playing Minesweeper.

- Resilient Infrastructure: Energy security, digital independence, food logistics — these are defence pillars. A warm home in winter is a strategic asset.

- Agility and Autonomy: Build a command culture that doesn’t wait for permission from seventeen committees before making decisions. Ukraine’s edge came from flexibility.

Let’s be blunt: Europe must stop preparing for yesterday’s wars with tomorrow’s budgets. We need fewer generals and more strategists, fewer weapons expos and more simulation labs. We need civil-military partnerships that don’t just tick boxes, but set global standards. And we need to realize that true strength lies not in how loud your cannon is, but in how unpredictable your move is.

Wars are not won by brute force alone. They are won in classrooms, innovation labs, coding hubs, and strategic circles often long before the first shot is fired. Europe has the brains. It has the potential. What it needs now is the political will to invest in the defence of the mind. Because if the war in Ukraine has taught us anything, it’s this: tanks rust. Ideas endure.


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