Europe and Canada say they'll spend more on defense
BRUSSELS
Italy's Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani speaks with the media after a meeting of the North Atlantic Council in foreign ministers format at NATO headquarters in Brussels, Friday, April 4, 2025.
European NATO allies and Canada on Friday said on April 4 they are willing to ramp up defense spending but are cool on U.S demands for the size of their military budgets, particularly given President Donald Trump’s readiness to draw closer to Russian leader Vladimir Putin.
U.S. allies have spent billions of dollars more on defense since Putin ordered a full-scale invasion of Ukraine three years ago, but almost a third of them still do not meet NATO’s target of at least 2 percent of their gross domestic product.
Trump has said that U.S. allies should commit to spending at least 5 percent, but that would require investment at an unprecedented scale.
According to NATO figures, the U.S. was projected to have spent 3.38 percent last year, the only ally whose spending has dropped over the last decade.
“It is important that we all agree that Russia is a threat. If not, I don’t know why we should always increase more and more defense spending,” Canada's Foreign Minister Melanie Joly told reporters at NATO headquarters in Brussels.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said that his country has set itself an “objective of 3-3.5 percent, which is about the level of American defense spending.”
He said new funds should be spent on European rather than American equipment. In recent years, European allies placed around two-thirds of their equipment orders with U.S. defense companies.
Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide said that NATO members are working on setting a new spending target, to be announced at the next summit in June.
