Saab CEO Micael Johansson expressed concerns about Europe's ability to quickly respond to defense needs amid rising threats from Russia. He emphasized that even with announced spending increases of 3.5% to 5% of GDP, bureaucratic delays in deciding and implementing these budgets could take years to materialize into contracts. Johansson highlighted Sweden's defense spending boost as an example, which would take military decision-makers over six months to allocate effectively. He stressed the urgent need for integrated defense systems and accelerated manufacturing capabilities in Europe to better safeguard against potential aggressors.
Now, we want to spend like 3.5% to 5% of GDP on defense. But then, when you start getting into the normal processes in terms of, okay, defense forces have to decide what to spend the money on, and then it has to be acquired by someone.
The process is much too long still. It takes a long time before it gets into industry.
We’re still looking at a couple of years before you actually get going, which is not good enough, I think, in times of war. Which is tragic.
Europe has to take its own responsibility, so we need to have integrated our missile defense systems, the collaborative combat aircraft, we need to have space technology, we need to have hubs where we can do ammunition manufacturing.
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