European Union should have an army .

May we have a good debate. I do not wish to debate semantics, but I must provide two definitions for clarification. Should - aux. v. P. t. of shall. - Used to express obligation, necessity, probability, or contingency. (American Heritage Dictionary, Third Ed. ) My opponent clearly wants to express necessity in his resolution. So be it. If he thinks my interpretation incorrect, I'm sure I'll know. Necessary - adj. - 1. Absolutely essential; indispensable 2. Unavoidably determined; inevitable 3. Required, as by obligation, compulsion, or convention. I will be dealing with the first definition of necessary in this case, as again I assume this was Milukas' intent. Unfortunately, there is no necessity as regards the creation of a European Union Army. The present forces of each individual nation are sufficient, especially for the rather vague and limited mandate they act on. In addition, 22 of the 27 "independent and sovereign nations" of the EU are also members of NATO. The member nations already cooperate quite well and frequently with each other. Naturally there are logistical problems; this should not come as a shock for any who grasp the rich diversity of Europe's peoples. With care, however, these problems can be worked down to a bare minimum. I fail to see how a new EU-military-unto-itself could do much better than whatever that minimum happens to be. Again, it is not a necessity, therefore by definition my opponent's stance toward the resolution at hand is incorrect. "1 - One army for EU would be good politically , it would make them more unite[d] and they would exercise more power . 'United we stand, divided we fall. ' Aesop" -The EU is already "united," hence European *Union* And to what end would they [the EU] exercise their added power? That is, if one can really claim that they would have more power. The EU has as much power as it has, regardless of whether they have a single military or each nation cooperates accordingly with its own forces. A single military may give the appearance of more power, but nothing more unless great policy changes went along with its creation. A single military would undermine the sovereignty of all of its member states, however. This is about one step away from a new "European Empire. " You also speak of the "exercise of more [military] power" as if it were automatically a good thing. Anyone remember Napoleon? "2 - They would spend less money in long term , because they would produce more of the same weapons , mass production. " -I gathered from this wreckage of verbiage that you are referring to a logistical problem. Perhaps the best minds in Europe could find solutions without a requisite EU ARMY. "3 - All military secret technologies would be shared and scientist[s] would cooperate more . 'Two heads are better th[a]n one. '" -I request proof to verify the validity of this claim. What part of the EU is lacking in secret military technology? Also, if the owners of these secrets told the rest of the EU, it wouldn't really be secret, would it? :) I submit that all of my opponent's arguments are invalid, even if we excuse his blunder in the creation of the debate resolution. I look forward to a response. Back to you, Milukas Britt