The laggards include several of NATO’s, and the world’s, wealthiest nations — among them Canada, Italy and Spain. The economic output of those three countries alone is nearly triple that of Russia. Yet each remains far from meeting NATO’s target of spending 2 percent of gross domestic product annually on defense — a goal all member countries agreed nearly a decade ago to reach by next year. What’s more, the alliance now regards that spending level as a minimum to address the mounting perils it faces.
The consequences of shouldering, or failing to shoulder, NATO’s spending burden are important both as geopolitical signaling and on-the-ground preparedness. As Vladimir Putin shifts the Russian economy to a war footing to sustain a bloody campaign that could go on for years, the West needs to show it is marshaling its own, much more significant resources for a long-term struggle. Falling short would only encourage the Kremlin’s bet that time is its ally.
The on-the-ground results of missing NATO’s spending target are just as grave. Canada, which has the world’s ninth-biggest economy, is an object lesson.
According to a secret Pentagon document obtained by The Post this spring, the Canadian Armed Forces themselves this year concluded that because of “enduring” defense spending shortfalls, Canada “could not conduct a major [military] operation” while simultaneously maintaining its aid to Ukraine and leading a battle group of a couple thousand troops in Latvia, a tiny NATO nation that borders Russia.
That flat-footed posture, and other problems with military readiness, recruitment and retention that Canadian officials have acknowledged, should be triggering alarms in Ottawa. In April, former senior Canadian military, security and intelligence officials and experts issued a dire warning to the government. “Years of restraint, cost cutting, downsizing and deferred investment have meant that Canada’s defense capabilities have atrophied,” they said in an open letter.
Canada’s miserly military outlays also leave it ill-equipped to help its U.S. partners defend the continent in the North American Aerospace Defense Command, known as NORAD. Ottawa also lacks muscle in the Arctic, where Russia and China are intensifying their activities.
Despite that, and despite strains with NATO arising from Canada’s shortfalls, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has told allies that Ottawa will never meet the alliance’s 2 percent defense spending target, according to the classified document, which The Post obtained after it was leaked to the Discord messaging app. It devotes just under 1.4 percent of its gross domestic product to military expenditures. The United States spends roughly 3.5 percent of GDP on defense.
Canada is not NATO’s only laggard; this year, just 11 of the alliance’s 31 members will hit or surpass the 2 percent mark. Italy, with an economy slightly bigger than Canada’s, devotes only slightly more of its output to defense than Canada does.
Ottawa has made substantial contributions to Ukraine’s defense and financial stability, and resettled tens of thousands of Ukrainian refugees. But despite some major recent defense investments — Canada paid $19 billion for 88 U.S.-made F-35 fighter jets this year and is spending twice that much to modernize its NORAD capabilities, according to the defense ministry — other major NATO states are moving faster.
France, a nuclear-armed state with a formidable military, has embarked on its biggest defense spending in a half-century, and is expected to hit the 2 percent mark in the next few years. Germany, for years a relative free-rider in NATO, last year announced a special $100 billion fund for additional defense spending over five years; it also boosted regular military outlays in the budget even as expenses were slashed in nearly every other category. Berlin is on target to meet the 2 percent threshold next year, although it will slip back once the $100 billion fund is exhausted.
Left to their own devices, most countries would opt to spend more on butter and less on guns. Russia’s aggression, as well as the growing challenge posed by China, has deprived the West of that luxury. Mr. Putin’s decision to start the biggest war in Europe in nearly 80 years, and the peril the Kremlin will represent for the foreseeable future, means Western nations have little choice but to rise to a daunting new challenge. The sooner all of them get that message, the better.
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