On 12 July 2017, Luxembourg unveiled its defence guidelines to be implemented from 2025 onwards.
At a press conference yesterday, Luxembourg Secretary of State for Defence Francine Closener and Army Chief of Staff General Romain Mancinelli presented the "Guidelines Of the Luxembourg Defence 2025+ ", which lay down the framework for the evolution of the Grand Duchy’s defence and describe the political orientations for the coming years.
The unstable international security environment has changed international security and defence policies, and likewise Luxembourg defence needs to adapt to these changed circumstances. The guidelines set the stage for modernisation of the Luxembourg defence and army.
The guidelines for 2025 onwards include the following main orientations and objective, among others: the confirmation of the 2014 commitment to increase the Luxembourg defence effort by 50% until 2020 and to continue to increase this even after 2020, greater involvement of the army in the defence effort through investment, the modernisation of SRI (surveillance, recognition, intelligence) capabilities through investment in new technologies, such as drones, in line with the traditional mission of recognising the Luxembourg army, the development of the air force, and the establishment of a military medicine project including medical teams deployable in operation in the fields of traumatology surgery and infectious diseases, as well as a capacity of additional usable beds In the event of a crisis, integrated into an existing hospital structure.
The guidelines also outline the creation of the further development of skills and capabilities in the areas of future "space" and "cyber defence", the development of an industrial strategy, innovation and research in order to involve the Luxembourg economic fabric in the development of defence capabilities, the development of a recruitment strategy to meet the human resource needs, including specialists capable of developing and implementing defence and military capabilities, and the establishment of a national capacity development agency for the development and implementation of major investment projects.
For these new orientations, the defence will seek to acquire capacities with high added value in the recognised priority areas of competence, to study each project in the light of a possible usefulness for Luxembourg society and create sustainable structures that anchor defence in society whilst allowing better planning of the defence effort.
In addition, defence will focus on placing its approach in bilateral and multinational frameworks of cooperation and partnership in capacity development and deployment.
The guidelines will be outlined in a more concrete planning document, entitled "Defence Master Plan", updated on an annual basis.
Photo by EMA. L-R: Patrick Heck, Director of Defence; Francine Closener, Secretary of State for Defence; General Romain Mancinelli, Chief of Staff of the Army; Colonel Alain Duschene, Deputy Chief of Staff of the Army
