NATO highlighted this Wednesday the “unanimity” of the 32 allies in their commitments to the Alliance, and urged them to transform them into concrete capabilities and increase the purchase of weapons from the United States to transfer them to Ukraine. NATO Defense Ministers agreed to continue strengthening their ability to fulfill the commitments made at the Hague summit last June to invest more in defense.
“The good thing is that in The Hague there was unanimity, the 32 (allies), total unanimity. Spain totally agreed with the capabilities objectives. So I think it is important to know,” said the Secretary General of the Alliance, in a press conference at the end of the ministerial.
The Dutch politician thus referred to the objective committed in The Hague of investing 5% of GDP by 2035 (3.5% in pure military investment and 1.5% in related expenses) in defense, with which the capabilities assigned to each ally would be covered to continue being able to guarantee collective defense in NATO. However, Spain assured at that summit that it could cover the expense of the assigned capacity objectives.
Rutte today highlighted the “unanimity” of the 32 allies at that summit and Spain’s “total agreement” with the objectives assigned by the Alliance.
The day before, the president of the United States, Donald Trump, for being the only NATO member that has said that it is not going to spend 5% of its GDP on defense, and assured that Pedro Sánchez’s government is being “incredibly disrespectful” to the Alliance. Rutte praised Trump’s role in the Hague meeting: “He was extremely important in making the NATO summit a success,” he emphasized, and assured that, “without him, that 5% result would never have been reached.”
He explained that, thanks to this increase in military spending, the Alliance will be able to achieve the necessary capabilities objectives in the event that Article 5 of the Washington Treaty, on collective defense, is activated (in the event of an attack on an ally, the others come out to defend it as if they had been attacked on their territory).
The goal is “to do whatever is necessary in order to defend ourselves from attacks from Russia, terrorism or any other threat,” summarized the former Dutch prime minister, who added another reason to raise defense spending to that level: “We are now on equal terms with the United States,” he noted.
The United States Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, for his part, hoped that the new defense spending commitment agreed upon by NATO will be transformed “soon” into capabilities that strengthen the position of the Atlantic Alliance. “Firepower. That’s what’s coming, that’s what we expect from NATO,” Hegseth said at Alliance headquarters.
The old continent pays
In addition to discussing spending planning and drawing up a “credible roadmap to sustainability,” Rutte explained, the ministers addressed their deterrence and defense posture.
After the recent incursions of drones and even Russian fighters into the airspace of allies such as Poland and Estonia – which motivated the launch of “Eastern Sentinel”, a new surveillance mission on the eastern flank -, the ministers spoke of applying a series of additional measures against unmanned devices.
“The European Union and NATO are collaborating closely and we both know our strength,” said Rutte, who denied “duplications” when asked by him.
“The EU and NATO are working closely and we both know our strength”
Furthermore, during lunch they held a meeting of the NATO-Ukraine Council with their Ukrainian counterpart, Denis Shmigal, and Rutte expressed confidence that more and more allies will contribute to the so-called “PURL” initiative, which began last summer and consists of European allies and Canada purchasing American weapons to send to kyiv.
He recalled that Germany, Canada, the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Norway have already participated in the purchase of weapons from the United States worth 2 billion dollars, and highlighted that more than half of the allies plan to participate in the initiative.
“Our expectation today is that more countries will donate even more, buy even more, to provide Ukraine with the means necessary to bring that conflict to a peaceful conclusion,” Hegseth stressed.
