THE HAGUE – NATO agreed to increase defence spending from 2 % to 5% of GDP annually by 2035, announced Mark Rutte, the Secretary General of the Alliance, who addressed the media at the end of the formal part of the summit, which took place on 24-25 June in the Hague. According to Rutte, the new defence investment plan will be “decisive when it comes to ensuring effective deterrence and defence”.
In addition, he repeated several times that “America is totally committed to NATO”, but that it expects the allies in Europe and Canada to do more for their own defence. Earlier in the day, at the joint press conference with Rutte, US President Donald Trump praised the NATO spending plan.
“I’ve been asking them to go up to five per cent for a number of years, and they’re going up to 5%, that’s a big (jump) from 2% and a lot of people didn’t even pay the 2%”, Trump said.
The NATO Summit in the Hague was the first one attended by Trump since he was re-elected the US President and the first one hosted by Rutte since he was elected the Secretary General of the Alliance.
The declaration adopted at the end of the summit states that “united in the face of profound security threats and challenges, in particular the long- term threat posed by Russia to Euro-Atlantic security and the persistent threat of terrorism, Allies commit to invest 5% of GDP annually on core defence requirements as well as defence-and security-related spending by 2035 to ensure our individual and collective obligation”.
The document specifies that at least 3.5% of GDP will be allocated annually by 2035 “to resource core defence requirements, and to meet the NATO Capability Targets”, whereas up to 1.5% of GDP annually will be allocated to “protect our critical infrastructure, defend our networks, ensure our civil preparedness and resilience, unleash innovation, and strengthen our defence industrial base”.
“Allies agree to submit annual plans showing a credible, incremental path to reach this goal. The trajectory and balance of spending under this plan will be reviewed in 2029, in light of the strategic environment and updated Capability Targets”, the declaration notes.
At the same time, the Allies reaffirm their “enduring sovereign commitments to provide support to Ukraine, whose security contributes to ours, and, to this end, will include direct contributions towards Ukraine’s defence and its defence industry when calculating Allies’ defence spending”.
Also, NATO commits to “rapidly expand transatlantic defence industrial cooperation and to harness emerging technology and the spirit of innovation to advance our collective security”, and pledges to work “to eliminate defence trade barriers among Allies and will leverage our partnerships to promote defence industrial cooperation”.
Rutte: “We are very concerned about the Western Balkans”
Asked about the reason why that the Western Balkans is not mentioned at all in the Declaration, Mark Rutte said at the press conference that this time, “instead of long texts and many paragraphs of detailed explanations, the Allies wanted to focus on key issues”.
“We are very concerned about the region. We have KFOR in Kosovo and EUFOR in BiH. I recently visited the region and had extensive talks with leaders in the region, BiH, Kosovo, with the President of Kosovo, the President of Serbia. NATO is very concerned about the situation, we are coordinating very closely with Kaja Kallas and Ursula von der Leyen”, Rutte told Nezavisne novine.
The summit in the Hague was also attended by the Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama, the Montenegrin President Jakov Milatović, as well as the President of North Macedonia Gordana Siljanovska-Davkova.
After his meeting with the Secretary General of NATO, Rama said that the that the focus of the conversation was the Alliance’s commitments in the Western Balkans, as well as the strategic project of the New Port of Durres, where NATO was expected to have an important role with its commitment to building a military terminal.
According to Milatović, the decision to increase the spending is “crucial for strengthening NATO’s collective defence capabilities and ensuring the security of citizens and economies”.