Officially, the Strait of Messina lies outside Italy’s only designated NATO military mobility corridor — which begins at ports in the Puglia region on the heel of the Italian boot, crosses the Adriatic to Albania, and continues on to North Macedonia and Bulgaria. It is also unclear whether the strait features in the EU’s own military mobility network, whose corridors, according to people familiar with the discussions, are expected to align with NATO’s routes.
The Americans aren’t showing their hand for now. When asked about the bridge at the NATO summit in The Hague in late June, U.S. aides chuckled, but offered no immediate response.
Berlusconi bridge
Foreign Minister Tajani is a vocal advocate of the bridge. “We will make Italians understand that security is a broader concept than just tanks,” he said in a recent interview with business daily Milano Finanza.
“To achieve this, we will focus on infrastructure that also has civilian uses, such as the bridge over the Strait [of Messina], which falls within the concept of defense given that Sicily is a NATO platform,” he added.
Infrastructure Minister Salvini, Meloni’s other deputy, sees the bridge as something that could transform his far-right League party — originally the secessionist Northern League — into a successful nationwide political movement that also commits to a big project in the south.
“Of course,” he recently responded when asked by a reporter whether the bridge could help Italy reach its new NATO goal.“Infrastructure is also strategic from a security perspective in many ways, so if we invest more in security, some strategic infrastructure will also become part of this security plan.”