dpa
Brussels
The new NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte currently does not see any danger of a Russian attack on the defence alliance’s territory, but looks to the future with concern.
“No fear for now,” he said in an interview with dpa when asked whether NATO countries should be afraid of Russia, but added: “If we do not spend more and produce more, we have a serious problem in four or five years.” Russia massively expanded its defence production due to Moscow’s war against Ukraine. According to Rutte, NATO allies are not yet doing enough to counter this.
“We have to ramp up defence production, the defence industrial base,” he said. “They have to put in extra production lines, extra shifts, because we are not producing enough military stuff to protect ourselves longer term.” Rutte expects new demands from Trump Rutte also expects pressure from US President-elect Donald Trump, who threatened to withdraw from NATO during his first term in office if allies did not spend 2% of their gross domestic product (GDP) on defence.
NATO allies are committed to invest at least 2% of GDP in defence. And many European allies have now reached that goal, Rutte said. In four to five years, however, there will be a problem with deterrence against Russia if defence spending is not increasing further, he said.
Rutte did not say whether NATO allies should aim to spend 3% of GDP or even more.
A decision on new spending pledges is expected to be made at the alliance’s summit next June. During the US election campaign, Trump had announced that he considered it necessary to increase the NATO defence pledge to 3%. There have recently been reports that Trump could even call for 5%. Germany is expected to spend around 2.1% of GDP on defence this year. In the controversy over German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s continued refusal to deliver long-range Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine, Rutte made it clear that he would personally make a different decision and would not place any restrictions on the use of the weapons.
