NATO countries agree to increase defence spending to 5%

11 comments

1. What a headline! An then… *”…countries agreed a statement on Sunday for their upcoming summit that sets a goal of 5 per cent of GDP for annual defence and security-related spending by 2035…”*

2. All this to please someone who eats crayons for breakfast. Trump will never be happy, he will move the goalpost and demand more.

   We (european) nations should make sure every penny is spent in Europe.

3. There is no way this is going to get through. In my (unnamed) country, the increase in prices due to energy costs is so significant that any government suggesting 5% defense spending would instantly commit sudoku.

4. Meanwhile here in Germany the trains are a mess, the bridges are dilapidated and for anyone who wants to live in a city house and rent prices are jumping up year on year.. but good news for f*ing Rheinmetall 

5. What is the point of NATO if every country has to spend as much money as if they were all alone and isolated? It’s a big block, which means that to have a huge army and a lot of weaponry you need much less spending per capita.

   There goes my welfare state by the way. Fuck it.

6. It is absolutely moronic to raise spending this high just to appease an idiot who has repeatedly cast doubt on whether he would uphold his country’s obligations under NATO.

7. 5%… My country doesn’t even spend 5% on education. At this point is better just to build one EU army than have every single country spend 5% of their GDP.

8. Congratulations you chumps.

   Not only do you get tariffs.

   But you also take money away from your people to fund the American war machine (which is basically the Israeli warmachine).

   Open your purse strings for America’s greatest ally.

9. Fuck this spineless shit man. Most of our countries didnt even wanna spend 2%. And now we gotta save on other expenses to please an orange turd that will literally change his mind tomorrow.

10. > The alliance’s current defence spending target is 2 per cent of GDP but Trump insisted it should rise to 5 per cent – although he suggested on Friday that target should not apply to the United States.

    Lol! And apparently Spain isn’t an ‘ally’ lmao! Anyway they’ve only actually committed to 3.5%. The remaining 1.5% is to be achieved by building out anything they like such as roads, which they were likely already going to do and will now just recategorize as ‘defense’ spending. Now watch them struggle to meet even the 3.5% target by, for instance, just increasing soldiers’ pay (what Spain was actually planning on doing), which is effectively just a fiscal stimulus for the economy disguised as defense expenditure. Better paid soldiers is nice, but it doesn’t make your army any stronger.

    And keep in mind that all of this is gonna be financed by more debt. No, cutting those foreign aid budgets saves you next to nothing. This is gonna be paid for with mostly debt.

    I suppose a saving grace is that the target is to be achieved in 10 years, not rn.

11. So you understand, 5% of GDP does not mean 5% of the budget. For example, Canada has a GDP of 2 trillions (2000 billions), but a budget of about 500 billions. 5% of GDP would be 100 billions, which is equivalent to a staggering 20% of the federal budget. To match that increase, the country will either have to go in debt, cut services or most likely both.

Comments are closed.