NATO allies reluctant to increase spending goals – POLITICO read full article at worldnews365.me

Everyone seems to agree: NATO countries must spend more on defense. 

Just don’t ask them to put that in writing.

In 2014, the military alliance tried. And it came up with a mealy-mouthed result: Each country would “aim to move towards” spending at least 2 percent of its annual wealth on defense by 2024. For years, progress on this flimsy goal was, to put it mildly, halting.

But as that decade comes to a close, Russia’s war in Ukraine is changing attitudes. And now it’s time for NATO to set its next spending target.

Already, the troubling landscape has spurred numerous allies to add billions to their war chests. Yet at NATO, there’s hesitation to turn that impulse into a more formal target. While officials say a cluster of allies, particularly in Eastern Europe, are keen to go above 2 percent, not every European country agrees. 

Several countries “will be ready to join a commitment for more than 2 percent,” said one senior European diplomat. Yet, the diplomat added, “some European nations are not ready to support a new figure.” 

The looming debate offers a preview of the challenges NATO will have in meeting the aspirational aims it set down last year, including placing thousands of new troops at high readiness. Military specialists and former NATO officials say the alliance will have to clear the 2 percent hurdle if it wants to get there.

“There are a lot of allies where even if they were to spend 2 percent — even if they are now spending 2 percent — that’s not enough,” said Patrick Turner, a former British official who served as NATO’s assistant secretary general for defense policy and planning between 2018 and 2022.

Old debate, new world 

Western capitals currently face a triple challenge: sending weapons and equipment to Ukraine, refilling their own dwindling stockpiles and investing in more modern defense capabilities. 

If they can’t keep supplying Kyiv, higher spending advocates argue, the alliance will fail to return Europe to peace and face even higher costs as a result.

“If we really want to live in the peacetime, we have to invest much more,” said General Rajmund Andrzejczak, chief of the general staff of Poland’s armed forces. “If you’re losing Ukraine — we’re losing everything.”

There is also a sense that many allies simply neglected defense following the Cold War — prioritizing bread-and-butter issues as they assumed traditional military threats were a thing of the past.

“In [the] last 30 years, the gaps to be filled are quite big,” said Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur, who argued that a “start” should be for everyone to actually reach 2 percent.  

Back in 2014, only three allies — the U.S., U.K. and Greece — spent over 2 percent of their gross domestic product (GDP) on defense. At the time, some governments saw the pledge as merely symbolic. Now, about a third of the alliance — including many Eastern allies — is meeting or close to meeting the target. And there’s a caucus pushing to go further.

“3 percent is what Latvian government has agreed as target for 2027,” Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkēvičs said in a text message. “I would advocate for minimum 2.5% taking into account current geopolitical challenge,” he added, “but before that everyone at NATO should reach [the] agreed target.” 

Spending evangelists say going higher would actually put Europe in line with historical precedents. 

Turner, who now works at The Cohen Group, a consultancy, noted many European countries were actually around the 2.5 percent mark when the Cold War ended. And compared to today, that moment was “actually a rather peaceful, low-tension time,” he said. “China was not what it was today, Russia was certainly not what it is today.”

Then there’s the United States. The world’s military behemoth has been coaxing its NATO partners to take on more responsibility — especially as many in Washington see China as the more pressing long-term challenge. Donald Trump hostilely pushed the message. His successor, Joe Biden, has used a more encouraging tone. 

“My key strategic takeaway from the invasion of Ukraine is that the Russians have shown themselves to be unskilled in the art and science of conventional warfare,” said John Manza, a former U.S. official who previously served as NATO assistant secretary general for operations.

“I see this as a strategic opportunity for the United States to push allies to do more to defend themselves in Europe, so the U.S. can focus more resources against the threat from China,” he added. “We need the Europeans to step up and do more — and they can.” 

A senior U.S. official said the 2 percent target “is increasingly seen as a floor and not a ceiling” when asked about Washington’s stance in the negotiations over setting the next figure. Where allies land on the issue, though, is “still taking shape,” the official noted. 

“The last year has demonstrated that allied defense capabilities need strong and consistent funding, and allies have stepped up investments in defense,” the official added. 

An imperfect target 

Measuring military prowess as a slice of GDP is, of course, imperfect.

Notably, the GDP-based metric can mask significant differences in how money is actually used. The U.S., for example, spent around 39 percent of its defense expenditure on personnel-related costs in 2022, according to a June NATO estimate. Italy, however, spent 62 percent of its defense budget on personnel — leaving less money for investing in equipment, development and operations. 

“There’s not a direct correlation between spending money and capabilities and readiness,” said Manza, the former U.S. and NATO official who is now a professor at the Joint Advanced Warfighting School.

That said, benchmarks are not pointless.

In 2014, allies also committed to spending 20 percent of annual defense expenditure on major new equipment by 2024 — a promise that has been largely fulfilled. But now, experts say investment in new capabilities needs an even greater focus. 

Camille Grand, a former French official who until recently served as NATO’s assistant secretary general for defense investment, cautioned that the key is to look both at whether countries hit their marks consistently — and how they’re investing for the future.

“It’s not only a matter of having a few more tanks or planes that are with a proper level of readiness and availability — but it’s also to continue to invest in technology because this is how we the West make a difference,” he said. 

NATO fudge in the making 

The spending debate will take off in earnest in February at a meeting of NATO defense ministers, and culminate when leaders gather in Lithuania this summer for the alliance’s annual summit.

Even with recent moves to boost investment, many allies still lag behind 2 percent — and would be reluctant, for now, to make commitments beyond that. 

Germany, for example, has acknowledged that it could miss the 2 percent target in 2023 and possibly even later, despite earmarking €100 billion for a massive military infusion. And Canada has said it would need to spend tens of billions more before the end of 2027 just to hit 2 percent. 

In the end, the debate could end up with a classic political fudge — stick to 2 percent, but firm up the commitment about getting there and leave an open door to go beyond.

“At this stage, the common denominator for Vilnius could be built around ‘2 percent as the baseline and not the ceiling,’” said the senior European diplomat. While “small, this is nevertheless a step forward.”

A second senior European diplomat echoed the thought, saying the “most likely” option for allies will be “2 percent as a floor, not a ceiling, although a number of allies would like to go further.”

The result, specialists fear, could be a mismatch between NATO’s lofty war-time rhetoric last summer — and its ability to deliver on the resulting pledges.

“I always think it’s dangerous,” Manza said, “to over-promise and under-deliver.”