It's not that Europe has never developed the tech... the UK developed and launched an orbital rocket in the 60s/70s but it had to be shipped to Australia to be launched. I can't remember the specifics but I recall reading that Europe just isn't a geographically optimal place to launch rockets.
> has never developed the tech
Well... an European company controlled > 50% of the commercial orbital launch market back in the late 80s and 80s.
That might have been tricky to achieve without developing the tech first.
It's more than suitable if you don't care where the debris lands.