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Why the EEAS is fighting for its future
With a week of major articles looking at the EU’s foreign policy branch, POLITICO asks whether budget constraints, a lack of tools and a turf war with the European Commission is threatening its survival.
By NICHOLAS VINOCUR and JACOPO BARIGAZZI
in Brussels
Illustration by Natália Delgado / POLITICO
When EU leaders launched the bloc’s diplomatic service in 2011, the idea was to give Europe a much more powerful and unified voice on the world stage.
But in typical EU fashion, the leaders didn’t want that voice to be too strong. So they gave their new chief diplomat, the “high representative,” two bosses — themselves, and the European Commission.
“This was hashed out in a messy compromise at three in the morning,” remembers Pierre Sellal, France’s powerful ambassador to the EU for 10 years, who was deeply involved in the negotiations to design the European External Action Service (EEAS).
A decade and a half on, that messy EU compromise is unraveling.
Facing budget cuts, a battle for talent and a lack of policy tools to back up its diplomatic role, the EEAS, now headed by former Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, has been losing out in a protracted turf war with the Commission headed by Ursula von der Leyen ― while national governments, which have largely kept their foreign policy independence, are also weighing reform.
In more than a dozen conversations with POLITICO over the past three months, 10 current and former EU officials and diplomats described an EEAS in crisis, lacking a clear mission and largely unable to compete with the Commission’s much greater financial resources and policy firepower.
While Kallas is fighting back, unveiling new senior hires and promising internal reforms, EU countries have yet to publicly spell out plans to strengthen the service.
Today, and over the next few days, POLITICO is taking a comprehensive look at the problems, asking how the EEAS got here, and exploring the possible solutions that officials, diplomats and politicians are floating in Brussels and across Europe.
‘Dissolving’ the EEAS?
The crisis comes at a time when conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East — as well as tensions in the transatlantic relationship — have left the EU scrambling to adapt to a harsher global environment, putting its foreign policy strategy in the spotlight like never before. Nowhere near as powerful as the U.S. State Department or the foreign ministries of Paris, Berlin or London, and halfway through its 16th year, the EEAS is unsure what adulthood will look like.
Under Kallas’ leadership it has rallied EU countries to deliver 20 packages of sanctions against Russia while fostering relations with the Gulf and Middle Eastern countries. But critics say the body’s aim of promoting European interest around the world — of particular interest to smaller nations that lack their own extensive diplomatic network — has faltered amid a lack clear objectives and tools to do the job.
This is playing out in real time. Kallas has launched a response of sorts, unveiling a new leadership structure and promising to deliver internal reforms after the summer to strengthen the EEAS, according to a senior EU official.
But not everyone is convinced it’ll be enough to turn the tide.
Kaja Kallas speaks to the media ahead of a European Council meeting in Brussels on June 18, 2026. | Marco Tacca/Getty Images
“There is a group in both the Council [which represents the 27 national governments] and the Commission that would like to dissolve the EEAS,” said one EU official, who like others who spoke to POLITICO for this article was granted anonymity to talk in confidence about such a sensitive matter. “Others defend it, but they are not as strong.”
Kallas has also faced constant sniping from EU-based diplomats who feel she rode roughshod over them during the first months of her term in Brussels.
“The difficulties were there from the beginning,” said Sellal. “It’s just that now it’s becoming impossible to ignore them.”
Trump, China, trade, migration
The world has changed radically since the EEAS was established by a Council decision in 2010, as many of the diplomats and officials who spoke to POLITICO pointed out.
U.S. President Donald Trump has upended standards of acceptable public discourse, disrupting diplomacy. Wars and open competition between systemic rivals have replaced the rules-based order of the post-war era.
At the same time, severe budgetary constraints linked to years of economic stagnation in Europe are forcing vote-hungry governments to concentrate on pursuing targets that yield tangible results — particularly on tricky topics like migration and defense.
That’s where the confused division of responsibilities between the EEAS and the Commission comes into play, weakening the role of the diplomatic service.
EU leaders have largely been happy to let the Commission — with its financial firepower and policy tools spanning trade, technology, migration and industrial policy — execute power on their behalf over a growing range of subjects, which increasingly includes coordinating defense procurement for the bloc.
The EEAS, by contrast, is largely confined to gathering intelligence and coordinating foreign and security policy positions backed by EU capitals. Hardly the stuff of a powerful diplomatic department.
The role of European Council President António Costa, who (his website says) “has engaged closely with partners worldwide to strengthen the EU’s role and its global relations,” adds another dimension. It was Costa’s chief of staff, Pedro Lourtie, who contacted officials in Moscow twice over the past few weeks as the EU looked for ways to restart negotiations with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
While French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot has publicly defended the EEAS and its leader Kallas — and smaller nations say they benefit from its diplomatic network — governments have declined to put forward concrete plans to bolster its power and resources.
“In today’s world you cannot separate diplomacy from trade, from tech policy, from industrial policy,” said the EU diplomat. “All these instruments are in the hands of the Commission.”
António Costa is pictured during the G7 summit in Évian-les-Bains, France on June 15, 2026. | Pool photo by Isabel Infantes via Getty Images
It’s a structure that’s ripe for confusion because in theory, the EU executive is meant to propose and implement policy and leave high-level diplomacy to Kallas, as high representative, whose job title includes “foreign affairs and security policy.”
But in practice the line between what constitutes Commission policy and international diplomacy is blurry. And von der Leyen — who unlike Kallas doesn’t need unanimous support from EU governments for every policy move — has taken advantage of crisis situations to bolster her diplomatic profile, and so strengthen the Commission.
This was the case when she traveled to Egypt in 2024 to sign a €7 billion economic partnership with Cairo despite having no formal mandate from EU leaders.
It was also the case when von der Leyen’s chief of staff, Bjoern Seibert, attended high-level talks with the U.S. about ending Russia’s war against Ukraine in November 2025.
And it was the case last week when the Commission welcomed a delegation of Taliban officials to address migration issues.
Each of these examples concern matters that fall under the EU executive’s authority — mainly migration and development aid, Commission officials point out. But taken together they hint at a narrowing domain for the EEAS.
The curious case of the Mediterranean commissioner
Nowhere has the battle between the EEAS and the Commission been as stark as in the EU’s approach to Israel, particularly since the Hamas-led attacks on Oct. 7, 2023.
Von der Leyen has used her Mediterranean commissioner, Croatian Dubravka Šuica, to take the lead in an area which, again, many in the EEAS believe should be their domain.
Šuica has at times acted as von der Leyen’s informal representative for missions abroad, including attending February’s inaugural session of Trump’s Board of Peace, an international organization led by the U.S. that aims to oversee a ceasefire and reconstruction efforts in Gaza.
But it was this month’s activities that have raised eyebrows the most. Šuica traveled to Israel on June 22 to sign off on extending the mandate of two EU missions in Palestinian territories, which requires Israeli approval.
While there she held a press conference with Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar — who just days earlier had announced he was severing all contact with Kallas over reports she had used the word “apartheid” to describe his country, remarks she hasn’t denied or apologized for.
Officials from both the Commission and the EEAS played down the awkwardness of having a press conference between a European commissioner and a minister who won’t speak to Europe’s official chief diplomat. Šuica’s trip had been “long scheduled,” as had Kallas’s simultaneous trip to Amman, Jordan, according to EU officials.
Dubravka Šuica speaks to the media at the Berlaymont building in Brussels on July 17, 2025. | Thierry Monasse/Getty Images
But the optics were undeniable: One side of the EU, its executive branch, was carrying on business as usual with Israel. The other — in theory representing its member countries — could no longer speak to her Israeli counterpart.
“We just have no words for this,” said another EU diplomat. “It’s incoherent.”
Von der Leyen’s forays into diplomacy have prompted the odd pushback from national capitals — like when France’s Barrot told the Commission president to respect the bounds of her role in a speech before EU ambassadors in March.
But the resistance from EU capitals to what several officials described as the Commission’s “power grab” has so far been limited to rhetoric.
Getting personal
Adding to the sense of crisis is what countless Commission and EEAS staff describe as a personal rivalry between Kallas and von der Leyen.
Though the Commission president appointed Kallas and both of them hail from Brussels dynasties ― Kallas’ father was a Commission vice president and von der Leyen’s was one of Europe’s first civil servants ― the high representative’s outspoken style has grated against von der Leyen’s more cautious approach.
More than once Commission spokespeople have officially distanced themselves from Kallas’ public remarks, such as when she used the word “cancer” to describe the effect of China’s industrial overcapacity on the Commission.
Conversely, Kallas has at times let frustration with von der Leyen’s top-down style of management slip out, privately comparing the Commission president to a dictator at least once, according to a senior EU official.
And yet, even Kallas’ critics say the main problem facing the EEAS is a structural one rather than a personality conflict — which both politicians have publicly denied.
“Don’t forget that von der Leyen did not get along with [Kallas’ predecessor Josep] Borrell,” said an EU diplomat. “They may not love each other but this is a deeper issue.”
Talent transfers
It hasn’t helped Kallas that von der Leyen has lured top talent away from the EEAS since the start of her second term in 2024.
Among them is Simon Mordue, a veteran British-Irish EU official with more than three decades of experience in the institutions. Formerly an EEAS deputy secretary-general, Mordue now serves as the Commission’s chief diplomatic adviser.
Though the European Commission president appointed Kallas and both of them hail from Brussels dynasties, the high representative’s outspoken style has grated against Ursula von der Leyen’s more cautious approach. | Thierry Monasse/Getty Images
He is one of the principal architects of the Commission’s new European Security Strategy, in which the EEAS is expected to play only a limited role, according to two officials. Previous security strategies were drafted by the EEAS in coordination with the Commission.
Mordue is also a key figure in the Commission’s Group for External Coordination , which oversees the coordination of external policies across the institution, according to a senior EU official.
There Mordue works closely with Gert Jan Koopman, the Commission’s director-general for enlargement and the eastern neighborhood.
Together the pair are gradually shifting responsibility for Turkey, which is formally a candidate to become an EU member, away from the EEAS, the official said. (Kallas is due to travel to Turkey on Tuesday along with two other European commissioners.)
Mordue was one of the architects of the EU-Turkey migration pact struck during the Syrian refugee crisis in March 2016. His strong expertise on the country, and Koopman’s control over enlargement funding, have increasingly placed the Commission at the center of the relationship.
Stefano Sannino, a former secretary-general of the EEAS, effectively the body’s top civil servant, became head of the Commission’s Mediterranean unit, which von der Leyen created. (He has since left after being questioned by Belgian police over suspicion he misused EU funds).
Von der Leyen’s Commission has duplicated or replicated EEAS functions, such as its unit in charge of relations with the Middle East and North Africa, that previously resided only in the diplomatic arm.
New people, new plans
The EEAS has been hit by a wave of departures. In May POLITICO revealed that the secretary-general of the EEAS, Belén Martínez Carbonell, was leaving her post after less than two years on the job.
Kallas has fought back, unveiling a new leadership suite last week that includes former Dutch Defense Minister Kajsa Ollongren to replace Martínez Carbonell.
“I found this extremely positive,” said one EU official. “This reinforces the EEAS on security as Kajsa has a direct line to [NATO Secretary General Mark] Rutte.”
The nomination of David Cvach, France’s former ambassador to NATO, as deputy secretary general for peace and security, alongside Matti Maasikas, who’s confirmed as deputy secretary general after doing it in an acting capacity, underscores the desire to bolster the EEAS’s security credentials.
And more is to come: Kallas, who’s told her staff she welcomes the debate about reforming the EEAS, plans to unveil further changes after the summer, according to two EU officials aware of the inner workings+.
Kajsa Ollongren is pictured in The Hague on Jan. 11, 2022. | Patrick van Katwijk/BSR Agency/Getty Images
What’s next?
Other officials remain skeptical, saying the changes are unlikely to alter the basic antagonistic dynamic with the Commission, especially as the EEAS could be hit with budget cuts in the bloc’s next seven-year budget, the Multi-Annual Financial Framework, due to kick in in 2028. The 27 national governments and the European Parliament would have to agree to this.
“There could be more in store,” said one EU official of the planned budget, after the EEAS downsized 10 delegations and consolidated others at the start of Kallas’ term.
One senior EU official, asked to describe what could become of the EEAS, said: “The EEAS has to be an intelligence-gathering machine that can provide value-add via analytical work.”
Asked for his fix, Sellal paused at length.
“I like Kallas,” he said, pointing out that she was his intern years ago at the French permanent representation. “By creating these institutional innovations, we have probably over-complicated the system. It’s not about people.”
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