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NATO looks to hike defense spending
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NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg yesterday said the top priority for the transatlantic alliance is to increase defense spending, as demanded by United States President Donald Trump.
“Regardless of language, the most important thing is that we increase defense spending and that is exactly what we are doing,” Stoltenberg said when asked about NATO’s response to Trump’s calls for it to do more to share the burden with Washington.
On the campaign trail and in his first days in office, Trump appeared to put in doubt the near 70-year US security guarantee for NATO which he dubbed “obsolete” while accusing some allies of not paying their way.
His remarks caused consternation among the allies who, stung by Russia’s intervention in Ukraine, had agreed in 2014 to increase defense spending to 2 percent of national economic output by 2024, reversing years of cuts.
Stoltenberg said all 28 allies had agreed that commitment and they reaffirmed it last year at a Warsaw summit.
“That has been my top priority and I have raised it in all the meetings that I have had,” he told a press briefing before a NATO defense ministers meeting in Brussels today.
He said that in two phone calls with Trump, the new president “strongly expressed his strong commitment to NATO ... but in both calls he underlined fair burden sharing.”
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