At the NATO Defence Ministers’ meeting in Brussels, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth emphasised the urgent need for increased defence spending and industrial production to counter global threats.
Speaking ahead of the meeting, Rutte stressed that NATO must do more to ensure security in the coming years.
“Clearly, we have to do more. We have to ramp up defence spending, because we know we cannot protect ourselves four or five years from now if we don’t.”
Rutte acknowledged that the United States expects greater commitment from NATO’s European and Canadian members, saying:
“The US rightly requires us to do more here on the European side and the Canadian side of NATO. It’s only fair. It’s only sensible.”
This statement follows increasing calls from Washington for NATO allies to meet their spending commitments, ensuring a stronger transatlantic burden-sharing agreement.
Another key concern raised was the slow pace of weapons and ammunition production, with Rutte stressing that NATO members—including the US, Türkiye, and all European nations—must increase industrial output.
“We simply do not produce enough. We need to really get more output from our huge defence industrial base to keep up with Russia and the Chinese and others.”
This aligns with recent NATO discussions on bolstering supply chains, expanding production capacity, and securing long-term military readiness.
Ukraine ‘No Room for a Minsk III’
During the meeting, Ukraine was a central topic, with Rutte expressing optimism about a “clear convergence” on NATO’s approach to the conflict.
“We need peace in Ukraine. We have to make sure that Ukraine is in a position of strength. And, as you, Pete, said yesterday, we can never, ever, ever again have a Minsk Three situation where a peace is not durable.”
This statement underscores NATO’s commitment to ensuring that any future settlement in Ukraine does not repeat past mistakes, referencing the Minsk agreements, which were seen as failing to prevent Russia’s further aggression.
Rutte concluded by welcoming Secretary Hegseth to the alliance and reinforcing NATO’s determination to address growing security challenges collectively.
With global tensions rising, the Brussels meeting signals a push for greater defence spending, stronger industrial capabilities, and a firm stance on Ukraine, ensuring NATO remains prepared for the security challenges ahead.
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This should be a wake up call: we cannot rely on the US and should assume that they’re never coming to eNATO’s aid. All of eNATO, including us, needs to increase to at least 3% of GDP asap. I’d say be 2030 at the absolute latest. We could easily afford this, the political will just needs to be there!
They should look to Ukraine who is spending 26 percent of GDP on defence ! Invest now and save lots and lots of money
Fully agree with that.
We’d be spending hundreds of billions if we end up in war. It’s far cheaper to just invest more in defence now to deter war.
And if we spend as much of it as possible on UK businesses, producing equipment and munitions domestically, then it will increase jobs and boost the economy as a nice bonus!
The Ukrainian example is a little flawed to look at, considering they’re being invaded. I can imagine that there is a lot they’re currently not having to pay for from their GDP figures because of the financial aid given by other countries, allowing them to spend more of their GDP on defence.
I took it that he meant Ukraine is spending that much precisely because they’re at war.
Spend 3% now to try to deter war, or spend many times that later when war comes knocking.
I did Ukraine is at war and has to spend that much we have the chance to invest in deterrence and save money in the long run
Yeah now I’ve read it again, that’s the way I took it. Apologies Ya.
In WW1 UK defence spending topped out at about 48% of GDP. During WW2 the number was 52%… Given that Ukraine is also fighting a war of national survival I am surprised it is only 26% of GDP nor have they yet called up the younger cohort either… While I have every sympathy for the Ukrainians and fully support our commitment to them I do wonder why they seem to be holding back in some respects. Having said that there resilience is remarkable. The point about spending is that if we have to fight another major war against countries equipped… Read more »
The following link will take you to some graphs of UK defence spending and a %GDP…
https://www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/uk_national_defence_analysis
Cheers CR
I agree, it’s quite astounding at a time where the USA needs allies more than ever that’s it’s basically just spat in the face of all its most important and powerful allies. I suppose this is the level of strategy we can expect from a reality TV star and a Drunken Fox News Host.
But it’s clear that America is no longer a serious country and should have no role in the defence of the North Atlantic Area. Hopefully the US has the decency to just leave NATO so we don’t have to start over with a new organisation.
What would we do differently without the US in NATO that we can’t do with the US in NATO?
Spend a greater amount of money on defence, and spend more of it at home and in Europe on common procurement projects, as the US is clearly an unreliable ally.
How is the US stopping us from doing that right now?
Not have to listen to Pete Hegseth lecture us for a start. I’ll happily pay a few more percent on income tax for that.
To answer your second question about how is the US stopping us from doing that right now. They’re not, but clearly our own politicians aren’t taking it seriously, assuming that Uncle Sam would always do most of the heavy lifting.
Now it’s becoming more and more obvious that the US is unreliable, it might be the impetus needed to for HMG finally increase defence spending to the point where we have a credible armed forces that can sustain war against a peer or near-peer enemy e.g. Russia.
The US can bugger off out of NATO, and might as well take Hungary with them!
I’ll second that.
That would be silly. Putin and Xi would like nothing more than to split the West. JD Vance is correct when he says it is Europe which is abandoning the cultural values which created it. The US is emerging from its identity crises under Biden and Obama. In electing Trump it has sobered up and come to its senses. We need to do the same.
The thing is, we can’t easily afford it without either rasing taxes, borrowing more, or spending less on other things.And thats a hard sell to the British public when all of our public services need more money and borrowing is already at record highs along with taxes.
There are things that can be done. Governments just lack imagination.
Legalise class B & C drugs and regulate them. This would add several £billion from black market to legit economy. Do the same with brothels. Between them they could add another £15-20 billion a year to the economy at least.
Also, if defence spending is done right, e.g. more equipment and munitions purchased at home, then it will create more UK jobs and boost growth, so will in time offset any increased spending.
It’s also worth noting that expeditionary capabilities to support US operations are expensive as is supporting a global network of bases to support US operations.
Military capability to defend Europe from greatly diminished power like Russia is cheap. Just look at Finland.
Trump’s call for us to increase defence spending is just the excuse Rachel from accounts needs to increase stealth taxes and cut spending. Serendipity.
I would urge Europeans and our useless government to increase defence spending to 3 per cent of GDP and do it now and if they think it’s unaffordable they need to look at Ukraine. Ukraine is spending 26 percent of GDP on defence and looking closer to home the uk spent 45 percent ( I believe) of GDP on defence during ww2 invest now and build up deterrence , plus trump will happily commit to nato if this is done.
Trump won’t commit to NATO if this is done. As has been seen with his dealing with other countries, everything is transactional.
Were a NATO member to be attacked, and Article V triggered, before committing any US forces he’d want to know “what’s in it for me?”. As we see with Ukraine, the only reason he’s not throwing Ukraine under a bus is the large deposits of rare earth elements in the south east of the country.
Funny isn’t when the only country to actually invoke A5 is the US🙄
I agree Trump neither knows or cares about other NATO member spending, he sees an excuse to bash foreign “liberals” so he takes it. Europe should move to 3% now but very much as a means of breaking away from the USA. The UK in particular should increase spending to 3% but use the funds not to dramatically increase the size of our deployable forces but focus on replacing US participation in our defence. Chief amongst this should be to begin preparations for a UK manufactured SLBM to replace Trident II at the end of the planed life exploration date… Read more »
There’s a lot of what you say that I agree with and greater independence from US arms manufacture would be helpful. However, Trident simply isn’t a priority. We sink far too much into CASD as it stands (not that I have any real alternative), and spending even more on nuclear is of no clear benefit: it’s credible or it isn’t. Spending more doesn’t make it more of a deterrent.
I think it’s worth remembering that the US government is not the same as US Defence and Intelligence. FVEY is critical to UK Defence.
I agree on FYEY and I do really feel for the professional men and women of the US military and intelligence service but most of them will soon be gone. How could we even share intelligence with the USA on Russia knowing full well it’s being given to people literally on the Kremlin Payroll. The head of the FBI literally takes money direct from the kremlin. As for CASD I disagree, Russia’s conventional army is a joke. Europe has everything it needs to defeat a conventional Russia attack with little difficulty. The only real threat Russia poses is nuclear one… Read more »
Wondering when Trump is planning on upping USA defence spending to match that of, say Poland or Lithuania, as a % of GDP…
It’ll come.
Not through increased spending; he’ll just crash the US economy so that what they currently spend will be over 5% of their GDP.
I don’t think it’s just the US economy he’ll crash, but the entire federal government. The US could end up as a failed state.
Meanwhile if the US economy goes down the pan, the economies of the rest of the western world will be dragged down with it.
Trump is probably going to gut DoD spending next. Even if he cuts defence spending to 2% of GDP America will still be running a bigger budget deficit than all of Europe and the UK combined.
America has a big credit card but it’s got a high interest rate and even they have limits.
The only thing Trump cares about is tax cuts. He hates the military and he has now sidelined congress so LM building stuff in 48 states no longer matters. Expect the F35 to be canceled by the end of the year.
All wholly predictable. UKR is thrown under the bus, remember Afghanistan. Europe and the UK must have seen this coming and therefore will have a coherent strategy ready. I will not hold my breath.
Note sure where the UK tilt to the Pacific now lies.
We shouldn’t have a tilt to the Pacific.
Sod the US; let them deal with China on their own!
We are on one side; Russia, China, N Korea and Iran are on the other. We don’t get to choose which of them we fight. They’ll make sure of that.
Tell that to Trump’s Murica; they’ll choose whom they fight.
If the US won’t come to aid Europe against Russia; why should Europe come to the US’s aid against China? After all, we’re all just puny socialists who freeride off the US, so they don’t need our help.
“During the meeting, Ukraine was a central topic, with Rutte expressing optimism about a “clear convergence” on NATO’s approach to the conflict.” Well that’s polishing a turd…NATO is in complete divergence over Ukraine and is exposing massive levels of political weakness, it’s a shit show. UK, Poland and other are clear in that Ukraine needs to be supported to win Germany basically wants to support Ukraine only so Russia does not completely win..but does not want to really upset Russia The U.S. wants to not have anything to do with Ukraine and is now clearly in discussions with Russia to… Read more »
We need to step and create a European Army. NATO is no longer a reliable framework. the US wants to look only inwards and care for itself? so should we then.
European armies are already aligned with each other in NATO!IF the US was to pull out the framework of military cooperation would still exist!
To get 27+us to agree on funding,procurement and who builds the stuff at what cost is very unrealistic! Let’s face it one or two countries even in NATO are very lukewarm to that idea let alone a European army.
Well after yesterday announcement by the the US government ,is this going to make the UK to wake ⏰ up ? There still harping on but 2.5% when the economy picks up .Sorry no time MR Starmer Specially with the plans you and Reeves have .In fact 4% not 3% needs to be look at and that goes for the rest of Europe or you may not have a economy to worry about 😟
Increasing income tax a few points is the only answer and that will not happen. Expand the military? How we can not even staff what we have now. Best move the government could make is add Russian to the curriculum. Can you honestly imagine that God awful lawyer sending the military into war anyhow? Would he press the button, no way he would just surrender.
To be fair, plenty can be done to improve personnel levels.
– Ditch Capita and sort out the recruitment
– Increase military salaries
– Start visiting schools, colleges and universities again to attract interest
And anyone who thinks increasing income tax is the only answer lacks imagination!
The call for inceased spending will fall on deaf ears I,m afraid where the UK government is concerned . They just dont see defence as a priority . They may talk of a small increase to 2.5% at some indeterminate point in the future but that isnt nearly enough . We need to be looking at 3% as a minimum and 4% as a target to get us back to where we need to be in terms of capability and fulfilling our commitments . The RN in particular needs to double in size in terms of escort ships and subs
This is correct, nothing will change despite the worsening of the situation. For the U.K. it will be business as usual and the SDR will likely be a negative impact as most expect, U.K. politicians will continue to make statements that the countries forces cannot backup and look desperate. I don’t think it will just be the U.K, apart from the frontline nations I think Europe will continue to highlight their outrage at the situation of the US no longer giving its support to Europe but they won’t change anything either, they’ll just continue to complain. The reality is, even… Read more »
Hegserth’s speech yesterday and Trump’s canoodling with Putin sound a big alarm bell for NATO Europe but also the wider world. Trump completely ignores international law. The rules of warfare and occupation.were tightened up and extended following WW2, to ensure that never again could some nationalist racist fanatic run riot conquering territory and killing civilians. The rules are set out in Geneva Convention 4. A nation cannot seize another’s territory, cannot occupy it indefinitely, cannot drive out its inhabitants and settle its own people there, cannot rob the resources of the territory and so on. Doing any of the foregoing… Read more »
The route that Hegseth set out yesterday is pretty alarming and a seminal challenge to NATO Europe. They are obviously going to throw Ukraine under the bus to cement Trump-Putin symbiotic relations. Two elderly white, nationalist autocratslic land-grabbers turning the clock back to the dark days of.the 1930s. That is not at all in Europe’s or anyone else’s interests. Trump is happy to give away someone else’s territory and will bask in being a ‘deal-maker’ to his rabid domestic followers. Some deal, he has given the adversary 3verything they want and got nothing in return. Of course Putin or anyone… Read more »
Spot on; this is the way it has to go. What you describe is the resurrection of Europe from the grave it dug for itself in Lisbon.
There is no reason Europe should need the US help against Russia, it collectively has a larger population and significantly more economic power than Russia on its own, it has chosen to cut back its forces and capabilities leaving it with insufficient defences, this doesn’t make it someone else’s responsibility. Having an ally like the US should be to have significant overmatch to be an extra level of deterrent not for them to be THE deterrent, as Europe is not willing to do the heavy lifting. It’s a hard sell for any US government that protecting countries far from their… Read more »
On 5 December 1994, at a ceremony in Budapest, Ukraine gave up their nuclear arsenal in return for security guarantees from the United States, the UK and Russia. The US has obligations that the EU doesn’t.
As the other two guarantors no longer feel the need, perhaps Britain should fulfil its obligations by gifting Ukraine a dozen nukes.
I just remembered that. That is a massive point. Most of what I’ve read today I mostly agree with. The one point I would plainly like to say. We cannot and must not let that Pr+¥k Putin to invade a sovereign country. He says it’s because Finland and Sweden he feels backed into a corner. He caused this by his invasion of Ukraine 🇺🇦. We must not let trump get all pally with Putin again and let him have his way. This is what led to ww2. Ukraine gave up its nukes and was promised to be left alone. I… Read more »