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Europe Defense: Spending Target High 01/14 06:20
WARSAW, Poland (AP) -- The defense ministers of Europe's five top military
spenders said Monday they want to continue increasing their investments in
defense but described meeting President-elect Donald Trump's challenge for them
to raise spending to 5% of their overall economic output as complicated.
The defense ministers of Germany, France, Britain, Italy and Poland came
together near Warsaw for a meeting in a new format that they established after
Trump was re-elected last year. Their first meeting in this format of five NATO
members was held in Berlin in late November.
The five are seeking ways to maintain their support for Ukraine as U.S.
policy is expected to shift when Trump takes power. They also discussed how to
strengthen Ukraine's own weapons production capacity.
The German minister, Boris Pistorius, stressed at the start of the meeting
that they all support a just peace for Ukraine, one in which Kyiv has a say
over its fate. There are concerns in Europe that Trump could push Ukraine to
make unacceptable concessions to Russia.
The defense leaders also addressed questions of military spending after
Trump recently called for NATO allies to increase their spending to 5% of gross
domestic product, a level that no NATO member has reached -- not even Poland,
which is the closest, spending over 4% and expected to approach 5% this year.
Several of the ministers said that focusing on the number as a percentages
isn't enough.
"I just think that a static debate about percentages doesn't really help us
if it doesn't ultimately lead to the implementation of what NATO has agreed
upon together, what the goals must be," Pistorius said at a joint press
conference. "In my opinion, that's what matters."
He also said that for Germany to invest 5% in defense would mean spending a
little more than 40% of its entire national budget on defense. "I think that
would put an end to the debate very quickly," he said.
His Italian counterpart, Guido Crosetto, said his government knows it needs
to spend more on defense but also needs to weigh that against reviving the
economy.
"Increasing defense spending at a time of economic crisis is more
complicated than at other times," Crosetto said. "If we combine the two, that
is, if we make the European defense industry one of the ways in which we can
revive the economy, we can combine the two."
French Defense Minister Sbastien Lecornu said that while there will be
increases in security spending, they should not all go to purely military
purposes but also should be used to protect society against cyberattacks,
terrorism, and other non-military threats.
"And you're all repeating 2%, 3%, 4%, without really knowing what the point
is," Lecornu said, responding to a reporter's question. "Well, let me be
straightforward. The situation is worse than during the Cold War. It's worse
than during the Cold War simply because we have new areas that have become
militarized, and these are largely digital," Lecornu said.
"And you can see that we are in a world in which we can be defeated without
having been invaded. And that means that the responsibility for the defense of
our countries will go well beyond military issues alone," Lecornu said.
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