A record 23 of NATO’s 32 member nations are hitting the Western military alliance’s defense spending target this year, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said on Monday, as Russia’s war in Ukraine has raised the threat of expanding conflict in Europe.
The estimated figure is a nearly fourfold increase from 2021, when only six nations were meeting the goal. That was before Russian President Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
“Europeans are doing more for their collective security than just a few years ago,” Stoltenberg said in a speech at the Wilson Center research group in Washington.
Photo: AFP
After the speech, Stoltenberg met at the White House with US President Joe Biden.
The US president said that the alliance has become “larger, stronger and more united than it’s ever been” during Stoltenberg’s tenure.
Biden spoke affectionately of Stoltenberg, calling him “pal” and saying he wished that Stoltenberg, who has been NATO secretary-general since 2014, could serve another term when the current one expires in October.
“Together, we’ve deterred further Russian aggression in Europe,” Biden said. “We’ve strengthened NATO’s eastern flank ,making it clear that we’ll defend every single inch of NATO territory.”
Stoltenberg said that allies were buying more military equipment from the US.
“So NATO is good for US security, but NATO is also good for US jobs.” he said.
NATO members agreed last year to spend at least 2 percent of their GDP on defense. The surge in spending reflects worries about the war in Ukraine.
Poland, at more than 4 percent, and tiny Estonia both lead the US this year in the percentage of their GDP they spend on defense. Both nations border Russia.
Defense spending across European allies and Canada was up nearly 18 percent this year alone, the biggest increase in decades, according to NATO’s estimated figures released on Monday.
Some nations also are concerned about the possible re-election of former US president Donald Trump, who has characterized many NATO allies as freeloading on US military spending and said on the campaign trail that he would not defend NATO members that do not meet defense spending targets.
“Shifting US administrations have had the absolutely valid point to say that US allies are spending too little,” Stoltenberg told reporters. “The good news is that’s changing.”
Stoltenberg’s visit is laying the groundwork for what is expected to be a pivotal summit of NATO leaders in Washington next month.
The mutual-defense alliance has grown in strength and size since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine two years ago, with both Sweden and Finland joining.
Defense spending by many European nations fell after the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union seemed to neutralize what was then the prime security threat to the West, but after Russia seized Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014, NATO members unanimously agreed to spend at least 2 percent of their GDP on defense within a decade.
The full-scale invasion that Putin launched in 2022 spurred European nations newly on the front line of a war in Europe to put more resources into meeting that target.
Much of the focus of the summit is expected to address what NATO and NATO member governments can do for Ukraine. They so far have resisted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s appeals to take his nation into the bloc as long as the war is still ongoing.
Stoltenberg pointed to efforts to bolster Ukraine in the meantime. That includes NATO streamlining the eventual membership process for Ukraine, and individual NATO nations providing updated arms and training to Ukraine’s military, including the US giving it F-16s.
“The idea is to move them [Ukraine] so close to membership that when the time comes, when there is consensus, they can become a member straight away,” Stoltenberg said.
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