Experts & Staff

Nick Witney

Senior Policy Fellow

Areas of expertise

International relations; international security policy; European security and defence policy; military capabilities development; defence equipment cooperation; research and industry; Middle East and North Africa; the Middle East Peace Process

Languages

English, French, Arabic

Biography

Nick Witney is a senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. His topics of focus range from the European Security and Defence Policy to the Middle East Peace Process.

Witney previously served as the first chief executive of the European Defence Agency in Brussels. High Representative Javier Solana chose him in January 2004 to lead the project team charged with developing the concept and blueprint for the agency. The European Council approved the team’s proposals in July 2004, an achievement recognised by European Voice in nominating Witney as one of its 50 “Europeans of the Year”. After that, he was appointed to establish and run the agency for its first three years.

Witney’s early career, after reading Classics at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, was spent in British government service, first with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and later with the Ministry of Defence (MOD). As a diplomat, he learned Arabic in Lebanon and Jordan, served in Baghdad, and spent four years as private secretary to the British ambassador in Washington, D.C.

Working with the MOD, Witney took on a wide range of responsibilities, including planning and finance, defence exports (the al-Yamamah programme with Saudi Arabia), nuclear policy, the defence estate (running the privatisation of the MOD’s married quarters housing stock), the new Labour government’s 1998 Strategic Defence Review, the forward Equipment Programme, and defence industrial policy. His last job before leaving for Brussels was as the MOD’s director-general of International Security Policy, where he was responsible for NATO and EU policy as well as missile defence.

Europe and Tunisia: After complicity, complacency

Tunisians see Europe as complicit with the old regime of President Ben Ali, and were disappointed by the slow reaction of European leaders to their revolution. But they are willing to forgive, if their neighbours to the north makes amends by offering prompt and generous help as they rebuild their country.

NATO self-cancelling summit

The Lisbon summit has drawn a line under a fractious period for NATO. But as it reaches out to Russia and withdraws from Afghanistan, the alliance is still struggling to find a new purpose.

A strategic rubicon

The announcement of a Franco-British defence partnership will be a watershed in European security thinking. Once that Rubicon has been crossed it will raise questions for their EU partners, and perhaps this will have a profound bearing on whether Europe can keep a seat in the global game.

Eyes tight shut

Britain’s defence review is deeply flawed because it is based on a self-deluding picture of the world. It brings to mind the spectacle of the Viking King, Canute, who one thousand years ago commanded the tide to stop on an English beach.

Time to get pedalling

Just possibly, EU defence ministers may have realised that only their personal engagement will ensure co-operation between their military staff. This is vital as European countries look for a way to retain effective security capabilities in an era of shrinking budgets.

Bringing good news from Ghent

If there was ever a moment for defence ministers to pool their efforts and resources, then this is it. Defence budgets across the continent are being severely cut as austerity measures kick in. Ahead of the defence ministers’ meeting in Ghent on 23-24 September, Nick Witney points out that the Lisbon Treaty offers defence ministers a ready-made ‘transnational defence cooperation’ device in the form of PESCO – and urges them to use it.

Sharing aircraft carriers

Tight budgets mean hard choices. For instance, new aircraft carriers would be lovely but they cost a lot. As the UK’s Strategic Defence and Security Review reaches its final stages, Nick Witney argues that perhaps it’s time to start sharing with the French.

Hedgehog Europe?

What is defence really for and what should Europe do after defence budgets have been ravaged by the economic crisis? In the second of a two part series of podcasts, Daniel Korski talks to Nick Witney about how European security will have to be rethought from the ground up after the economic crisis – and how the best option might be to become a spikey, hedgehog-like larger version of Switzerland

A responsible government must re-examine Trident

Tomorrow night?s foreign policy Leaders? Debate will cover a lot of ground, and Trident will no doubt be discussed. Nick Witney argues that a post-election defence review that does not include Trident is irresponsible and absurd.

A new START, but that doesn’t mean it’s NOFUN

Obama’s moves over nuclear weapons need putting in context. The US no longer needs them to equalise the USSR’s conventional forces, but others might need nuclear weapons to equalise the US military

Publications

Articles

Sanity returns to British foreign policy

Rishi Sunak has reintroduced sensible pragmatism to British foreign policy – but the nature of today’s Tory party means he is not out of the woods yet

The end of Brexit fever

As Britain reels from its latest political fiasco, the conspiracy of silence on Brexit is finally over

The Truss premiership: Winter is coming

The new British prime minister is on a collision course with reality – and leaders across Europe may not even bank on her remaining in Downing Street for long

Specials

Podcasts

In the media