NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte expects new pressure from US President-elect Donald Trump due to relatively low defense spending among European allies, including in Germany.
“They will ask us to do more,” Rutte said in an interview with dpa.
NATO members have committed to invest at least two percent of their gross domestic product (GDP) in defense. Many European allies have reached that goal, Rutte said. However, in four to five years there will be problems with deterring Russia if defense investments are not further increased, he said.
Rutte did not say whether NATO allies should aim to spend three percent of GDP on defense or even more. A decision on the new allocations is expected to be made at the NATO summit next June.
Trump said in the election campaign that he believed it was necessary to increase the defense spending to three percent. Recently, there have been reports that Trump may even demand five percent. Trump believes that European allies do too little for defense and rely too much on US protection. In his first term, he even threatened to withdraw the USA from NATO due to low defense spending in Europe.
Germany has recently significantly increased defense spending, but it will only reach a share of around 2.1 percent of GDP this year. The US consistently spends well over three percent of GDP on defense.
(Vijesti.ba)
