NATO chief Mark Rutte wants to convince American President-elect Donald Trump to give European partners easier access to weapon systems from the American defense industry. The arms deal is intended to prevent new disputes…
Spending by European allies in the US already amounts to hundreds of billions of dollars, Rutte said. But there could be much more “if the US defense industry were liberalized and more open and you didn’t have to get approval from Congress, the Pentagon and the White House.”
As an example of the enormous potential, Rutte cited the demand from European partners for Patriot-type missile defense systems. ‘They cost two billion each. “That is an enormous amount of money for the US and for the American economy,” Rutte said. It currently takes a huge amount of time to bring Patriot systems to Europe.
Are Rutte’s calculations correct?
The background to Rutte’s plans includes his expectation that Trump as US president will put new pressure on European allies with relatively low defense spending. From the Republicans’ point of view, the European partners do far too little on defense and rely too much on American protection. During his first term from 2017 to 2021, Trump even threatened to leave NATO.
Most recently, Trump demanded on Tuesday that allies would spend five percent of their gross domestic product on defense in the future. For many countries, this would mean more than doubling their defense spending. It was expected that Rutte would make statements about this on Thursday. Moreover, Trump is straining relations with his alliance partners with his takeover fantasies of Canada and Greenland.
New regulations could prevent disputes
In principle, liberalizing the US defense market could make it easier for the countries involved to invest more money and at the same time allow Trump to claim to his voters that he has strengthened US industry.
It is also possible that relaxing restrictions on the US defense industry will reduce the risk of political disputes over the purchase of weapons systems from non-NATO countries. Recently, there had been problems for years because Turkey had purchased the S-400 missile defense system from Russia. The government in Ankara justified this, among other things, by saying that it had tried in vain for a long time to adopt the American Patriot system.
NATO Secretary General Rutte has emphasized several times recently that he also believes that higher defense spending by the Europeans is necessary. Overall, European allies are now investing more than two percent of their gross domestic product in defense, he argues. But in four to five years, if you don’t spend more, you’re going to have a deterrence problem against Russia.
Source: Krone
I am Ida Scott, a journalist and content author with a passion for uncovering the truth. I have been writing professionally for Today Times Live since 2020 and specialize in political news. My career began when I was just 17; I had already developed a knack for research and an eye for detail which made me stand out from my peers.
