Structural Permitting Bottlenecks Impeding Industrial Investment and Defence Readiness in the European Union

The speed at which the European Union authorises new industrial facilities has become a decisive variable for the continent’s security. In recent years, companies, governments and investors have begun to assess the credibility of European strategies not only on the basis of allocated resources or political commitments, but above all on how quickly projects can move from decision to operational reality.

The issue affects the entire industrial spectrum, yet it carries particular weight in the defence sector, where the demands revealed by the war in Ukraine have brought back into focus production capacities that had long been treated as peripheral.

This analysis answers: How do EU industrial-facility permitting and authorisation timelines act as a decisive variable for defence readiness? Why do permitting bottlenecks carry particular weight in the defence sector after the war in Ukraine? Which actors (companies, governments, investors) are affected and how do they assess project credibility? What regulatory and administrative reforms would move projects from decision to operational reality faster?