EUROPE - Brussels signs off military plan and hails historic day without UK. Brussels has moved even closer to an EU Army after 23 states signed off on a key military agreement today - a move a high-ranking eurocrat hailed as a "historic day". Germany and France are leading the charge for a new defence union, which aims to cement EU unity after Brexit. The campaign for a European defence union stretches back to the 1950s, although the movement has stuttered in the decades since. One unnamed official quoted by Reuters news agency said today: “We've never come this far before. We are in a new situation.”