NATO, defense spending, Greenland: Europe finds Trump's new demands unrealistic

At the beginning of the week, Donald Trump said that NATO members should spend 5% of GDP on defense, rather than the minimum 2%. According to various estimates, this is an unattainable goal for most countries. In addition, the US president-elect's recent demands that NATO partners cede territory to the United States risk undermining the allies' trust.

This is reported by UNN with reference to The Wall Street Journal, AFP, Politico and Euronews.

Details

US President-elect Donald Trump said yesterday that he does not rule out the use of military and economic pressure to regain control of the Panama Canal and increase US influence in Greenland.

Trump, who will take office on January 20, has also said he will demand significantly more defense spending from North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) allies. The president-elect seems to be opening up a new flank of the debate, experts and politicians say.

Calls for significantly higher spending on armaments and the threat of seizing allied land are increasing pressure on the Allies.

Several German politicians responded to Trump's call for European NATO members to increase defense spending to 5% of gross domestic product.

Ralf Stegner, a member of Germany's Social Democratic Party (SPD), called Trump's comments "nonsense and absolutely insane" in a Facebook post. And in an interview with Politico, Stegner said:

We do not need more weapons in the world, we need fewer

Markus Faber, Chairman of the German Parliament's Defense Committee, noted that 5% is too much. But the German representative also emphasized that NATO countries will have to agree on a new goal that would exceed 2% - this goal should be 3%, and the decision should be made by consensus.

First, we really need to reach the 2% mark. German GDP. We have not yet reached the goal," Friedrich Merz, German chancellor candidate, said in an interview with Bayerischer Rundfunk.

According to Jan Lesser of the German Marshall Fund think tank: "it is completely unrealistic to imagine that almost all NATO allies will reach the 5% level, at least in the short term.

Defense Minister Guido Crossetto also reacted to Trump's words:

"I don't think it's going to be 5 percent - that would be impossible for almost all countries in the world at this time - but as I've been saying for some time, it's not going to be the 2 percent that we're already trying to achieve, but it's going to be more like 2 percent." 

According to Polityka Insight analyst Marek Sverchinsky, this 5 percent is a goal that is unattainable for most EU countries, including Poland.

"I assume that after Trump's statement, the situation in some European capitals could have become very aggravated, because this level is unattainable for most European countries. Even 3% would be a big problem," explained the analyst, who heads the security and international relations department at the Polityka Insight think tank.

Reference

Ten years ago, NATO countries agreed to increase their defense spending to 2% of their GDP, and in 2023 they decided to make this goal a baseline. However, in 2024, only 23 out of 32 NATO member states were able to reach this threshold.

NATO's main military power, the United States, allocates 3.38%, while European heavyweights such as France and Germany barely exceed 2%.

It should be noted that there are significant changes in the increase in spending in Eastern Europe. As noted by UNN, in 2024, the Czech Ministry of Defense allocated 166.8 billion Czech crowns (about 6.6 billion euros) for defense spending, which is equivalent to 2.09% of the country's GDP. 

Poland is declaratively the closest to the new, higher threshold - according to Dziennik Gazeta Prawna, Poland will spend 4.7 percent this year.

Meanwhile, Europe is also warning Trump not to send the military to strengthen US influence over Greenland's borders.

France has warned Donald Trump against establishing control over Greenland through military force or economic coercion.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said that the European Union "will not allow other countries of the world to attack its sovereign borders, whoever they are".

The minister spoke out after an interview with the US president-elect, in which he did not rule out the use of military or economic actions to try to seize Greenland and the Panama Canal.

Context

Donald Trump has previously stated his desire to take control of Greenland and the Panama Canalunder US control. At the same time, he refused to rule out an attempt to seize these territories by force.

The reason is the favorable geographical location and vast natural resources of the largest island in the world. The Danish authorities, as well as the Prime Minister of Greenland, state that the island is not for sale.

Previously

Donald Trump Jr landed in Greenland on Tuesday, just weeks after his father, President-elect Donald Trump, reiterated his desire to gain control of the autonomous Danish territory.

Panamanian authorities have declared inviolable sovereignty over the inter-oceanic canal in response to Trump's threats. Experts and locals called the idea of American control over the canal "remote and absurd.