Trump's Defense Pick Mattis to Focus NATO Members on Spending
- Europe’s contribution still a long way off 2 percent pledge
- Trump has underlined strong NATO commitment, Stoltenberg says
President Trump: We Strongly Support NATO
U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis heads to his first NATO meeting on Wednesday, with his European counterparts seeking reassurance of the U.S.’s commitment to trans-Atlantic cooperation. The alliance is struggling to boost defense spending in the face of U.S. criticism that Europe isn’t pulling its weight.
Exactly a month after President Donald Trump described the North Atlantic Treaty Organization as obsolete, defense ministers from the alliance’s 27 other countries will seek reassurances about the new administration’s loyalty. Faced with Trump’s calls to spend more on their own security, the Europeans will at the two-day meeting in Brussels restate their pledge to invest 2 percent of gross domestic product on defense by 2024, but will likely avoid commitments to accelerate the process.