The concluding remarks in the last paragraph are not accurate. It is not an article about PESCO or the EU reliance on US and definitely PESCO has not been established to counter US or NATO. How PESCO contributes to EU strategic autonomy is good to be mentioned in a separate paragraph earlier in the text. Here is a sentence from the Council Recommendations on the progress of PESCO (open source): “By addressing Europe’s current and future security and defence needs, notably with their current and future efforts to fulfil their more binding commitments, the pMS contribute to enhancing the Union’s capacity to act as a security provider and its strategic autonomy, and strengthen its ability to cooperate with partners and to protect its citizens”. For PESCO contribution to strategic autonomy there is also an article by Daniel Fiott (2018) “Strategic autonomy: towards ‘European sovereignty’ in defence?” and an article in Politico (11/20): “Low defense spending puts strategic autonomy at risk, EU review says”.

• Not only US posses a challenge to EU endeavor to strategic autonomy, China is too and maybe others.

• PESCO is up and running since 2017. So the paragraph with reference to Nováky has to be updated. I sent you already the notification made by Member States pursuing article 42(6).

• Jorge Domecq was the former EDA Chief Executive. What is mentioned in the article are his reflections some years ago.

• CARD is the Coordinated Annual Review on Defence. Such an annual review helps foster capability development addressing shortfalls, deepen defence cooperation and ensure more optimal use, including coherence, of defence spending plans. The objective of the CARD is “to develop, on a voluntary basis, a more structured way to deliver identified capabilities based on greater transparency, political visibility and commitment from Member States”. These words have been taken from EDA website. There are numerous open sources about CARD to write and be more accurate while providing expert’s view on its relevance to strategic autonomy.

• The executive summary of CARD report 2020 which is available from open sources gives two very important findings about strategic autonomy one under defence spending and the other under defence planning. The wording used ties perfectly together some of the aspects covered by the article.

• To the extent that this is possible with the sources and references used, I would prefer to see defence instead of military capabilities (i.e when it comes to cooperation between member states avoid military to the extent possible and replace defence)

I do not recommend to change the whole article. I liked the part mentioning the integrated fiscal policy and health union as a tangible recent step. I also liked the part on US view of EU strategic autonomy. To improve the article, I would propose to check all the points provided above and the sources recommended. I expect a time flow starting with a background and maybe a definition linked with official EU documents rather than relying on expert’s interpretation (experts’ views complement the argument). Continue how it is evolved over the years. Conclude keeping Europe in the center and what is expected or needed to be done in the following years.

If by improving the article the writer needs additional words/time, please inform me