NATO leaders on Wednesday endorsed a plan to raise defense spending to 5% of their nations’ gross domestic product by 2035, a significant diplomatic win for President Donald Trump, who has long pressed allies to stop “freeloading” and contribute more to their own defense.
According to Reuters, nearly all NATO members supported the commitment, with the exception of Spain and possibly Slovakia. A formal signing of the agreement is expected before the summit concludes on Wednesday.
The new defense spending goal more than doubles NATO’s existing 2% benchmark. Under the plan, 3.5% of GDP would go toward traditional military expenditures, including air defense and troop recruitment, while the remaining 1.5% could be allocated to infrastructure projects—such as roads and bridges—that support military mobility.
“There is absolute conviction with my colleagues at the table that, given this threat from the Russians, given the international security situation, there is no alternative,” NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte told reporters.
Finnish President Alexander Stubb, whose country borders Russia, described the shift as “the birth of a new NATO, which means a more balanced NATO and a NATO which has more European responsibility.”
Spain broke ranks by declaring it would not meet the new spending target, arguing it could fulfill its NATO obligations with significantly lower defense expenditures—a stance that sparked frustration among several leaders at the summit, including Rutte.
“We fully respect the legitimate desire of other countries to increase their defense investment, but we are not going to do it,” Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said. In 2024, Spain’s defense spending as a percentage of GDP was 1.28%, the lowest among NATO members.
Slovakia appears poised to follow Spain in shunning the spending increase. Slovakia’s Prime Minister Robert Fico said Tuesday that his country “has other priorities in the coming years than armament.”
W?adys?aw Kosiniak-Kamysz, Poland’s Deputy Prime Minister, criticized Spain’s refusal to meet the new target, highlighting that Poland currently allocates a larger share of its GDP to defense than any other NATO member.
“We believe that any deviation from this principle by any member country is a bad example,” Kosiniak-Kamysz said before flying to the summit. “It’s incredibly unfair to the alliance,” another NATO official said to POLITICO.
