The Spanish Prime Minister has confirmed an additional €10.4 billion investment in defense and security, aiming to raise the country’s military spending from 1.28% of GDP in 2024 to the 2% target set by NATO in 2014.
Spain will invest an additional €10.4 billion in defence to meet NATO’s 2% target by 2025, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez officially announced after Tuesday’s ministerial meeting in Madrid, News.Az reports citing Euronews.
The centre-left leader emphasised that Spain remains a “pacifist” country and said the new investments are intended as a deterrent to “those who might think of attacking Europe”.
Less than a fifth of the plan’s funds will be allocated to the “purchase of arms in the traditional sense of the word”, the Socialist leader added.
Under the proposed defence and security plan, 35% of the new investments will go toward improving the working conditions of troops, over 31% to new telecom technologies and cybersecurity, nearly 19% to defence and deterrence tools, and close to 17% to support for emergency and natural disaster management.
Sánchez told reporters that the new investments will not affect citizens’ pockets, as the Spanish government does not foresee any tax increases, growth in public debt, or cuts to the welfare state in order to raise the country’s defence and security spending to around €34 billion in 2025.
“The money will come from the post-pandemic recovery funds, from the Government’s savings thanks to economic growth, from the margin given to us by items that were included in the 2023 Budget and which are no longer needed,” Sánchez said.
Moreover, Sánchez promised that most of the investments (around 87%) will go to Spanish businesses, and that less than 5% will be spent outside the EU. “The aim of this project is to make a new technological and industrial leap,” he argued.
The Spanish security and defence plan will be submitted for analysis to the European Commission and NATO on Wednesday.