NATO expands military commitments

Article Excerpt

The U.S. continues to urge each member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) to meet its 2014 pledge to spend 2% of GDP on defense by 2024. Currently, only five of the organization’s 28 member nations—the U.K., Greece, Estonia, Poland and the U.S.—meet that goal. At 1.8% of GDP, France’s defense spending in 2017 fell short of its target, as did Germany’s (1.2%) and Canada’s (1.3%). Belgium and Spain, among other members, spent less than 1%. Still, NATO members are expanding their defense budgets: for 2017, 81% of them increased their spending. On average that translates into a 3.1% rise in defense spending. Excluding the U.S., that increase is 4.9%. If all NATO members achieve their 2% of GDP target, that would expand their collective military spending by $119 billion, or roughly 7% of global defense spending for 2017. 2017…