US defence secretary chides Nato allies as their military spending plans fall short

US President Donald Trump’s defence secretary told European allies yesterday to step up efforts to increase military budgets and warned that troop contributions to missions did not exempt them from spending goals.

Speaking two days after Mr Trump proposed a 30 per cent increase in American military funding for Europe to deter Russia, Defence Secretary Jim Mattis said allies should follow the US example.

“He insisted Nato allies show the same kind of commitment,” said an official present at the closed-door meeting of defence ministers at Nato headquarters in Brussels, Belgium.

US officials declined to comment on Mr Mattis’s address. But diplomats said the remarks reminded Europe that he had not given up on the tough message he took to Nato a year ago, when he said allies needed to honour spending pledges or risk less support from the US.

Mr Mattis joined defence ministers to discuss the individual plans that Nato countries have submitted for the first time to show how they will reach a target to spend 2 per cent of economic output on defence every year by 2024.

Mr Trump is set to review the plans at a Nato summit in July.

Fifteen of the 28 countries, excluding the US, now have a strategy to meet a Nato benchmark agreed in 2014 in response to Russia’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea region,.

But Spain and Germany, Europe’s biggest economy, have said they will not meet the 2024 target.

Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Italy, Portugal, Norway and Denmark are also lagging, while Hungary expects to meet the goal by 2026.

Nato data shows that Britain, Greece, Romania, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania meet, or are close to, the 2 per cent goal.

France will increase its defence spending by more than a third between now and 2025.

Allies said Nato goals needed to take into account countries such as Italy and Germany that are big contributors to the body’s missions, such as in Afghanistan, diplomats said.

Mr Mattis was adamant that meeting the 2 per cent annual target agreed at a summit in 2014 in Wales was paramount.

“He made the point that cash, capabilities and commitments are not interchangeable,” the Nato official said.