Faced with the return of Donald Trump to the White House on January 20, 2025, Europeans declare themselves determined to make a greater decision “part of the burden” of their collective defense. Meeting on Tuesday, November 19 in Warsaw, the foreign ministers of the five largest countries of the European Union (Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Poland), as well as the United Kingdom, committed to “they play an even more important role in ensuring their own security, together with their transatlantic partners”as they stated in their final statement.
Since his first term, which began in 2016, the president-elect has demanded that Europeans spend more on their own defense. The latter expect a similar, or even harsher, speech in his second term. Taking this into account, they already promise to increase their “security and defense expenses, in accordance with [leurs] previous commitments, while reaffirming that, in many cases, more than 2% of gross domestic product will need to be spent to address growing security threats.”. In recent months, the idea of setting a new spending limit within NATO at 3% of GDP has even circulated, which would require a significant new financial effort.
Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine broke out, Europeans have already made significant budgetary efforts. In 2024, 23 of the 32 NATO allies will spend at least 2% of their GDP on their defense, and the Twenty-Seven, on average, 1.9% of their GDP. However, there are significant differences between Poland and Lithuania, which now invest more than 4% of their GDP in defending themselves, and Italy, which stagnates at 1.5% of its GDP, and Spain, which spends only 1.3%. % of yours to him.
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According to data from the European Defense Agency, published on Tuesday, European states should have invested, in 2024, some 326 billion euros for their defense, compared to 240 billion euros in 2022, an increase of a third compared to to the period. And defense industries have noticed the difference. According to data from ASD, the European lobby for defense companies, their turnover increased by 17% in 2023, reaching the sum of 158.8 billion euros, which shows that companies based in the Old Continent capture part of new investments.
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