NATO alliance defends military spending amid Trump criticism

Merkel warns against trade war

BRUSSELS, July 4, (Agencies): NATO allies are pushing back against US criticism that they are not spending enough on defense as President Donald Trump ratchets up pressure ahead of a summit next week.

In the weeks leading up to NATO’s July 11-12 summit in Brussels, Trump sent letters to the governments of Norway, other European allies and Canada demanding that they boost their defense spending.

After Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014, NATO allies agreed to stop cutting defense budgets, to start spending more as their economies grew and to move toward a goal of devoting 2 percent of GDP to defense within a decade.

In an email Tuesday to The Associated Press, Norwegian Defense Minister Frank Bakke-Jensen said “Norway stands by its decision of the NATO Summit in 2014 and is following up on this.”

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Norway has spent “far beyond” NATO’s target on new military equipment, he added.

In Germany, “we stand by the 2 percent goal we’ve set,” Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen said Tuesday. “We’re on the path there. And we’re prepared ... to take substantial responsibility within the alliance,” she added. When faced with the suggestion that the German government’s explanations might not impress Trump, von der Leyen retorted: “We don’t want to impress anyone.”

Germany is “investing as much as necessary, as appropriate and as is fair toward our common allies or partners in the alliance,” she said.

The upcoming NATO summit is the first major meeting since the fractious Group of Seven talks in Canada last month. NATO officials are concerned that trans-Atlantic divisions over trade tariffs, as well as the US pullout from the Paris global climate agreement and the Iran nuclear deal, could undermine alliance unity.

In the letter to Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg, dated June 19, Trump wrote that despite her country’s important role in the alliance Norway “remains the only NATO ally sharing a border with Russia that lacks a credible plan to spend 2 percent of its gross domestic product on defense.”

The stance was repeated in a similar letter to Belgium, where Trump said it will “become increasingly difficult to justify to American citizens why some countries continue to fail to meet our shared collective security commitments.”

Trump dressed down his NATO counterparts last year, publicly berating them for not spending enough and claiming they owe the US money. When he first came to office he even suggested that the US — by far NATO’s most powerful ally — might not protect countries that don’t pull their weight.

Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel played down the importance of the letter he received, saying it was “typical” of things sent ahead of meetings like the NATO summit.

“I am not too intimidated by this type of mail,” he said, adding that Belgium is doing its part in the military alliance.

“We participate in many military operations with our NATO allies and it is this government that decided to end the systematic reduction of defense spending,” he said.

In Canada, Defense Minister Harjit Sajjan’s chief of communications said the government has committed to increasing funding by more than 70 percent over the next decade.

Meanwhile, Denmark’s prime minister said Wednesday a letter from President Donald Trump accusing NATO allies of not spending enough on defense focused too much on figures but not on what countries have done.

Lars Loekke Rasmussen said Trump demonstrated “a unilateral focus on military spending as a percentage of the gross domestic product on defense.” He added: “We can be proud of our contribution to the common security and Denmark will stand tall at the NATO summit next week.”

He was referring to a letter Trump sent ahead of a July 11-12 summit to several NATO allies in Europe and Canada demanding they boost their defense spending.

Trump wrote that “the United States is increasingly unwilling to ignore the European failure to meet shared security commitments.”

After Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014, NATO allies agreed to stop cutting defense budgets and start moving toward a goal of devoting 2 percent of GDP to defense within a decade.

“We recognize that Denmark is taking action to increase defense spending,” Trump wrote in the letter, dated June 19, to Denmark’s prime minister. “Still there is no explanation as to why the United States continues to devote more resources to the defense of Europe when the continent’s economies, including Denmark’s, are doing well. There is a growing frustration that some Allies have not stepped up as promised.”

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German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Wednesday warned US President Donald Trump against unleashing an all-out trade war after he threatened to impose steep tariffs on cars from the European Union.

In a speech to the Bundestag federal parliament, Merkel said both sides were effectively locked in a “trade conflict” since Trump’s decision to slap punitive tariffs on steel and aluminium imports.

“It is worthwhile to prevent this conflict from becoming a real war,” she said, adding however that this “would require both sides” to take steps.

Trump on Sunday charged that Europe is “possibly as bad as China” on trade, as he reiterated that he is mulling import taxes of 20 percent on EU cars.

The EU has slapped tariffs on iconic US products including bourbon, jeans and Harley-Davidson motorcycles, as a symbolic tit-for-tat response to the metals duties.

Taking aim at Trump over his complaint that the EU, and in particular economic powerhouse Germany, is running a massive trade surplus against the US, Merkel said that his calculation is skewed as it is based only on goods, not services.