The ambassador, Matthew G. Whitaker, said on Tuesday that broader security-related expenditures could be counted toward the target – something that NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte has proposed – but that the definition needs to remain somewhat narrow.
“It’s definitely more than just missiles, tanks and howitzers – but it’s got to be defence-related,” Whitaker told reporters in Brussels. “It is not a grab bag for everything that you could possibly imagine.”
Rutte has previously proposed raising NATO’s traditional defence spending target to 3.5% of GDP, up from the current 2% target, and adding another 1.5% for additional broader security-related expenditures.
Whitaker’s comments come just before foreign ministers from NATO countries will gather in Antalya, Turkey, later this week. Contribution targets are expected to be discussed at the meeting, with a decision expected at NATO’s annual summit in The Hague in June.
Whitaker said that the 5% target could include spending on areas like mobility, infrastructure and cybersecurity, but “with a special emphasis on the NATO capability targets that all of the allies have agreed to”.
NATO’s country-specific capability targets call on members to get certain kinds of military hardware and troops in order to guarantee overall alliance capabilities in the event of a war. NATO is currently working on updating those targets for the first time since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
A number of NATO countries have voiced support for raising defence spending since the invasion, although there remains disagreement about how high spending targets should go and what spending should count.
US President Donald Trump first demanded a jump to 5% in January, just before returning to the White House.
The US has long urged other NATO allies to increase their military spending. In addition to Trump, several previous US presidents have complained that other NATO members have not contributed adequately to the alliance’s defence capabilities.
(bts)