Hegseth: NATO to become a tough military alliance again

TT

Published 08.13

 

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, right, and US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegeseth. Archive photo. Photo: Virginia Mayo/AP/TT/

When NATO defense ministers meet in Brussels, US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth will be there.

– NATO must return to being a real and tough military alliance, with real capacity to meet threats and defend Europe, says Hegseth at the beginning of the meeting.

At the beginning of last year, Hegseth had bitter words to say about NATO's capacity and the defense budgets of Canada and the European NATO countries. But, assures NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, Hegseth is a great friend of NATO.

– But he has said that the US has expectations of NATO and has made it clear that European countries and Canada must set their defense budgets so that they correspond to the US's, says Rutte.

Both Rutte and Hegseth talk about a NATO 3.0, a NATO that can and wants to and is capable of more when it comes to meeting military threats. A step on the way was the decision at last year's NATO summit in The Hague, where the alliance agreed to aim for the equivalent of 5 percent of GDP for defense.

One of the points at the meeting in Brussels, and at the NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey in July, is to check how NATO countries are on the path towards 5 percent on military defense and total defense. The goal is to be reached by 2035.

According to Mark Rutte, Europe is on the right track, he highlights a 20 percent increase in defense budgets last year and that a country like Germany is doubling its defense budget.