European Defense Finds One Answer and One New Question
A CV90 infantry fighting vehicle during a military demonstration at the Bardufoss Airbase in Norway on March 13, 2026.
Photographer: John MacDougall/AFP/Getty Images
Sweden, the country that brought the tank-like Volvo station wagon to safety conscious parents in the 1970s, is now bringing to continental Europe the nearest thing it has to a common infantry fighting vehicle (IFV). And it’s for some of the same reasons.
Visiting the BAE Systems Plc Hägglunds factory about halfway up Sweden’s coastline where the CV90 is made last week, I saw two pointers to the future of European defense — one positive, one much less so. The good news was that Managing Director Tommy Gustafsson-Rask and his team in Örnsköldsvik seem — through sheer force of pragmatism — to have found a way through the inertia that for decades has foiled efforts at consolidating Europe’s defense procurement. The bad news? Drones.