With regard to making war, the European Union (EU) is either characterized as being “from Venus” or as having made the transition from “garrison state” to “civilian state.” Drawing on the work from Charles Tilly, this thesis will show that neither characterization provides an accurate depiction of European behavior where the use of coercive force is concerned. To best understand the behavior of the EU it is necessary to conceive of it as a certain kind of state, and to highlight the ways in which peacekeeping and humanitarian interventions serve the same purposes as classical war-making. This thesis will use the examples of interventions in the former Yugoslavia and Iraq as case studies.