US warns of consequences for NATO members without clear spending plans, signalling high expectations from allies.<\/p>\n
Published On 6 Jul 20266 Jul 2026<\/p>\n
NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte has demanded that NATO allies put forward \u201cclear, concrete and credible plans\u201d to reach the organisation\u2019s spending targets at its annual summit in Ankara, Turkiye.<\/p>\n
Rutte was speaking in Ankara on Monday ahead of a two-day summit starting on Tuesday. It comes at a crucial time for the alliance, with the United States scaling down its security role in Europe. Washington has been pressing allies to shoulder more of the spending burden.<\/p>\n
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The 32 NATO nations agreed last year to invest five percent of their gross domestic product on defence \u2013 3.5 percent on their defence budgets and 1.5 percent on roads, bridges and ports so troops and equipment can move faster in times of conflict.<\/p>\n
Spain endorsed the goal but said that it could fulfil NATO\u2019s security requirements without spending so much. Some countries are still struggling to meet the alliance\u2019s old target of two percent of gross domestic product (GDP).<\/p>\n
\u201cIf one or two of them still have to be convinced, we have ways to do that,\u201d Rutte said, when asked what would happen to allies that don\u2019t have a clear plan. He did not elaborate.<\/p>\n
US Ambassador to NATO Matthew Whitaker suggested last week that the United States does have something in store for those who do not step up, but he declined to say what that might be.<\/p>\n
\u201c[US] President [Donald] Trump fully expects that all allies will step up immediately and get on the path to five percent and do it with urgency,\u201d Whitaker said.<\/p>\n
On spending by European allies and Canada, Rutte said that \u201cthe evidence we see so far is impressive\u201d. He said NATO estimates they will invest a combined $258bn more in defence in 2025 and this year than they have in previous years.<\/p>\n
But the numbers might not be enough to satisfy the Trump administration.<\/p>\n
Amsterdam announces deal worth billions<\/p>\n
Separately on Monday, the Netherlands \u2060\u2060said it will announce defence \u2060\u2060deals and plans worth more than 3 billion euros ($3.43 billion) in Ankara on Tuesday, Dutch Defence Minister Dilan Yesilgoz told Reuters.<\/p>\n
In an interview in the Turkish capital, Yesilgoz said the \u2060\u2060announcements would include partnerships with Belgium on air defence and with Britain on naval ships. She said the Netherlands was also looking to engage in more joint projects with Germany.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have several levels of plans with \u200c\u200ccountries around us, within NATO,\u201d Yesilgoz said. \u201cFor the Netherlands, it will be \u2026 well over 3 billion euros that we will have new \u2013 not only pledges, but concrete plans.\u201d<\/p>\n
Yesilgoz did not provide more details ahead of the official announcements, which are intended as part of a blizzard of proclamations by NATO members at the forum \u2060\u2060to show they are spending more on defence, as \u2060\u2060demanded by the US.<\/p>\n
Trump calls for \u2018loyalty\u2019<\/p>\n
The US president has repeatedly criticised Washington\u2019s allies over defence spending, and in the past threatened not to come to the aid of any NATO member not doing enough.<\/p>\n
Trump has called for \u201cloyalty\u201d from NATO allies, after some of them declined to allow the use of their bases in the US-Israeli war on Iran.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need our allies in NATO to step up and assume leadership roles, and I mean that not only in sort of loud cheerleading but also the moral authority and the moral compass of the alliance,\u201d US ambassador Whitaker said last week.<\/p>\n
Asked if she was \u2060\u2060confident the US would remain engaged in NATO \u2060\u2060despite Trump\u2019s suggestions that he may no longer be committed to the alliance, Dutch Defence Minister Yesilgoz said: \u201cI have to be confident, because I know that we need each other.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"US warns of consequences for NATO members without clear spending plans, signalling high expectations from allies. Published On…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6338,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[46,47,158,7,54,466,39,1464],"class_list":["post-6337","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-canada","tag-europe","tag-middle-east","tag-nato","tag-news","tag-turkey","tag-united-kingdom","tag-us-canada"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6337","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6337"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6337\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6338"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6337"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6337"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/nato\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6337"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}