There’s a way forward for sovereign European space intel, but is there the will?

Germany’s top intelligence officials made waves last year by calling for the creation of a European spy network to lessen Europe’s dependence on American intelligence. After Washington’s sudden freeze of American intelligence sharing with Ukraine in March, German officials — and their European counterparts — have grown increasingly attuned to deficiencies in key capabilities they need to deter Russia amid a less-reliable United States security commitment. One such deficiency lies in the realm of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) satellites. European countries need to scale up their ability to share satellite data through existing EU institutions, or risk being left blind and deaf to aggressive Russian activity if the American security commitment to Europe continues to wane. European states have the mechanisms to begin solving this problem, but only if they have the political will to pool information traditionally kept in their respective capitols.