This dissertation ends with the assertion that the European Union did not have anything that resembled a common foreign policy in the period 1994 to 1998 and prospects for the European Union asserting itself in the near future are limited by the extent to which states find it is in their self interest to facilitate the Union's development. This dissertation covers a wide range of evolving issues. The interests of the United States change over time, and the European Security and Defence Identity (ESDI) continues to grow. The fact that these events necessarily occur in a dynamic international environment makes writing on the subject difficult in anything more than an immediate context. One objective of this dissertation, therefore, will be to identify trends as opposed to producing analysis of the situation at a given moment. The intent is to produce analysis that is of on-going utility, rather than simple immediate interest. The overall purpose of this dissertation is to examine the prospects for the development of an ESDI and the ways in which possible developments will effect U.S. interests in Europe. The basic argument is that the European Union will not make a quantum leap to an independent European collective defence organisation capable of projecting significant power for Out-of-Area operations. During the 1990's fundamental changes which would facilitate such a capability were snail-like in their pace of development. As long as the European Union member states perceive that their interests are best served by very low level commitments then such will be the outcome of negotiations and political decisions. However, in the late 1990s there was increasing evidence that members of the European Union had begun to take concrete steps towards a rapid reaction force at least. There is no evidence to indicate that this is likely to change in the foreseeable future. This argument is supported by three pillars that are doubtless as heinous to the Europhiles as the pillars of European Union. First, European Union members have considerable differences between them that will continue to effect their ability to merge their policies: these differences are historical, cultural, geographical, political and economic in nature and are discussed in detail in Chapter Three. Second, the Europeans have no real need to develop their own military force outside of NATO as long as the United States will do the hard work for them. The United States has, since the end of World War II, played a fundamental role in European security and defence, and this forestalled the need for the Europeans to develop their own security and defence during the Cold War. Although the end of the Cold War changed the international security environment in drastic ways, it is the assertion of this dissertation that this relationship will be maintained because the United States still has very strong interests in Europe. The third reason for the sluggish development of an ESDI is that the members of the European Union do not perceive a military threat to Western Europe that necessitates the development and maintenance of a stronger military capability. This perception is also based on the continuing U.S. military presence and the security guarantee of NATO. All of these factors indicate that the existing pattern of development is a good indicator for future development. All out war is an anomaly in history however and adversaries that cannot be effectively combated with conventional military force increasingly pose security threats. Some even argue that the changing nature of war in the information age necessitates a reconsideration of the principles of war. This dissertation does not delve into the depths of military strategy, clinging instead to the political/military side of the fence. European security concerns can accordingly be divided into two primary categories, those that pose a threat of enormous destructive ability to the states of Western Europe [e.g., the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, a resurgent Russia] and those that do not. Threats in this second category (e.g. peripheral conflicts which require peace-making operations and natural or man-made situations requiring armed humanitarian intervention) have been identified as targets of Western European security. The second category of concerns is less devastating than the first category. Threats of the second type are becoming increasingly more prevalent, superseding Cold War-era concerns about threats of the first type. It stands to reason then that in the future the Europeans will direct more effort to combating asymmetric threats such as terrorism and organised crime than they will to developing a standing army capable of fighting and winning major regional contingencies. This is nowhere more clearly evident than in the former Yugoslavia. It can be argued that there are at least two reasons why the Balkans civil war became very important to the western powers and these reasons have important implications if viewed as indicators of potential future security concerns. First, the tragic events in the Balkans offered moving pictures and the prospect of an ongoing story, both of which cause the news media to slaver in confident expectation. Thus, the media played, and is likely to continue to play, an increasingly influential role in shaping West European and American security affairs. Second, the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the subsequent re-deployment of military forces left western governments in need of new roles for their military to perform. The capability to successfully undertake new roles, once it is widely perceived that old ones are obsolete, is undeniably in the interest of the military establishment. The more work the military has to do the larger their budgets are likely to be and the greater their influence. The changed international security environment, the changing nature of threats and the role of the media in defining public and administrative perceptions of security interests are all influential factors helping to define future security interests in the U.S. and Europe. The Europeans and the United States will continue to place high value on the maintenance of NATO, but the Organisation itself will undergo significant changes as a result of pressure to adapt to the new international security environment, not least of which is enlargement.