Sal's "Plan Italy" for NATO...and Herself
a hard problem with a simple solution
Italy has been a laggard in defense spending for a while. Although Italy claims, through some accounting tricks, to reach 2% of GDP, in reality, she is at ~1.5%, which still amounts to about $34 billion—right between Poland and Australia.
Italy is not a 3rd-tier economy.
So, let’s accept that Italy will be Italy. She won’t get to 5% of GDP on defense like some will (Poland for instance). We should give her some credit, and she decides to match the USA at ~3% of GDP.
With the numbers we have on our cocktail napkin that would get us another …. $34 billion? A doubling?
No, that is too optimistic. We can’t realistically expect that. We are talking about Italy here. We can’t expect her to match three-fifths of Poland’s effort, even with better food.
If we can’t get that full $34 billion doubling of defense spending, but perhaps can get a third of that to get between 2% and 2.5%, that would still get you ~$11 billion more.
What would they best spend that money on?
Well, let’s start with fundamentals…which means we need to look at a map.
Italy, my friends, is not a land power. That lady right there is a maritime and aerospace power whose primary defense responsibilities, for herself and the NATO alliance, should be the Mediterranean Sea from Gibraltar to the Suez Canal, with the area from Sardinia to Crete as an uncontested Italian lake.
Unlike her Roman predecessors, she has no concerns north of the Alps, only friends. Perhaps in the Balkans she might be needed, but again, she has mostly friends there. Due to her mild grasping in WWI and luck switching sides in WWII, she has no claim on others’ lands (residual grumpiness from the Plombières Agreement aside). She has no colonial concerns.
Like the USA, she should have an army, but one that is expeditionary and when possible, in reserve.
The present and future threat to Italian land and stability comes from the south, across the Mediterranean. She must control her sea approaches. With the Royal Navy but a sad shadow of herself and no longer capable of performing her duties in the Med as she once did and the French being…well…French, NATO needs a strong Italian navy and air force to secure NATO’s southern flank with other powers. She needs to be the center all power in the Med revolves around. Location and economic power make this a no-brainer.
She has a superb, if not small, defense industry. What could she do with an extra $11 billion a year or so? Let’s play nice and let the Italian army have a quarter and change of that, $3 billion. That leaves $8 billion for Italian air and sea power.
What should Italy spend that on? Well, it appears that they’ve already set the foundation for it…all they need is to know the number on the funding line.
Luca Peruzzi over at Naval News has a superb summary of the Italian Defence Multi-Year Planning document (DPP, Documento Programmatico Pluriennale) for 2024-26. It is very much worth a full read.
Where would I put the naval portion of the $8 billion I carved out above?
Having already acquired and putting into service 15 F-35Bs each for the Italian Navy and Air Force, with the new DPP, the Italian MoD has allocated new funding for the planned procurement of an additional 10 aircraft (5 for each service), taking the total to 40 STOVL aircraft.
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Another key programme announced by the new DPP is the long waited procurement of new long-range platforms under the joint Navy/Air Force Maritime Multi-Mission Aircraft (M3A) effort, as a replacement for the Atlantic Breguet 1, which last platform was retired in 2017.
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The new DPP also confirmed the 2 billion funding for the procurement and in-service and logistic support of the two FREMM EVO…
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Additional funding are also allocated to the new generation OPV & MMPC (Offshore Patrol Vessel & Multi-Modular Patrol Corvette) and MCMV programmes. The first regards both the OPV (PPX), of which the first four (out of six) are funded and steel cutting was celebrated in September 2024 for the first vessel…
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With all four U212 NFS (Near Future Submarine) platforms under contract and the first two under construction under OCCAR management, the programme also surpassed another key milestone last June with the activation of the Engineering Change Proposal for the integration of a Lithium Battery System developed and built in Italy. As anticipated, NAVARM will launch the risk reduction studies for the U212A MLU and Fourth Batch Sauro-class boats in order to maintain an eight submarines fleet before expanding it with a larger platform, funding permitting.
In addition to the LHD Trieste, which is expected to be delivered this month (November 2024) is becoming the largest vessel to enter into service with Italian Navy, the DPP also highlights continue support for the new three LPDs to be designed and built under the LXD programme.
There you go. No need to appreciate the problem or take half a decade to think about where to spend the money.
Fold the first bit of the pull-quote above with the last bit: buy more F-35B (a not insignificant percentage is built by Italian industry) and build carriers/large deck amphibs to fly them off of. Few things are more flexible in the Med.
Get your long range maritime patrol and reconnaissance force back to where it needs to be. The P-8 line is hot. Buy in. Yes, the Airbus A321 MPA if you must, but get them.
You have some of the best designed surface ships on the planet. Just build more.
Submarines? Yes.
Hard problems can be easy if the only hard part is finding the money and the political will to get it. The Italian defense industry produces on a per-capita basis, some of the world’s best product. Italy does not have to import much in kit or ideas. It is all right there.
Just fund it.
Italy will benefit. NATO will benefit. The West will benefit.
Served two tours in Italy, first was a national tour (CTF-63/COMNAVSURFMED) second a NATO tour with NAVSOUTH--which was the remnant of CINCMED, now under a (part time) Italian 4 star, but most of the staff were UK. Got to appreciate the Italian Navy quite a bit--very professional, but in a more laid back way than we were. Excellent ships.
My take was that the Italian politics were so chaotic that getting any kind of sustained defense commitment out of the government was a minor miracle. It is helpful to remember that there are really three Italys: Rome/Florence. The industrial North, and the South. Of course Sicily is an exception almost everything. Those three have radically different ideas about where resources are to be allocated and who gets to decide that allocation. Overlay that with a score or more of political parties and you can appreciate the problem.
There is also that most Italians have primary allegiance to theit family, second to their village or neighborhood and only lastly to the nation. This makes getting a unified anything agreed upon problematical.
Their Fremm and PPA are top notch and the fact that each is headed toward a beefed up flight II. I also like the Centauro II for the Marines should they ever see a need for their own mobile protected firepower.