![]() Nor does 2% have a direct relationship to any real security threat assessment. Correct spending levels on paper don't translate into adequate and well-equipped forces being quickly dispatched to the battlefield and sustained by efficient supply lines. Nor does big spending equal wise spending. NATO estimates that Turkey, with one of the organization’s biggest armed forces, will spend just 1.31% of GDP in 2023, compared to 1.91% before the war started. Growth fluctuates in times of economic boom and bust, and inflation can wreak havoc with the bottom line. While the 2% figure remains as a reference point, it’s a slippery metric. No date will be set for achieving this target. “At the summit, allies will set a more ambitious defense investment pledge, to invest a minimum of 2% of GDP annually on defense,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Friday. President Joe Biden and his NATO counterparts will commit to a new spending goal at their two-day summit in the Lithuanian capital Vilnius starting on Tuesday. ![]() ![]() With that target date closing in, and the biggest land war in Europe in decades ravaging Ukraine, U.S. Under a pledge made in 2014, after Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula, NATO allies agreed to halt the spending cuts they made in calmer times after the Cold War ended, boost their national military budgets and move toward spending 2% of GDP on defense by 2024. Still, the numbers are deceiving, and that goes for other members too, like Germany. That puts it at the foot of the 31-nation military alliance’s charts. One of NATO’s richest countries, and routinely ranked at the top of Europe’s economic growth tables, the Grand Duchy currently spends 0.72% of gross domestic product on its armed forces, according to the organization's estimates for this year. BRUSSELS – When it comes to criticizing the NATO members who fail to spend enough on defense, tiny Luxembourg is an easy target.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |