Donald Trump’s ongoing complaints that “NATO’s countries aren’t paying their fair share” still ring loudly with his supports nearly a decade after he started grousing about it. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, founded in 1949 to prevent Soviet expansion in Eastern Europe, is three years younger than Trump, and has been to date more important and effective. (The previously linked article, in fact, demonstrates that Trump has no mastery over the subject.)
In a speech a few months ago, Trump was still haranguing NATO countries that weren’t up to date on their “dues.” Recounting a conversation I seriously doubt ever happened, he claimed to have told our allies if Russia attacked a NATO member that was financially behind, he would “encourage them [Russia] to do whatever the hell they want.” What is especially rich about Trump’s comment, besides being Putin-subservient and geopolitically obtuse, is that Trump is one of the more prominent non-paying transgressors on the planet. He doesn’t pay his bills. His companies don’t pay their bills. His campaign doesn’t pay its bills. He’s put numerous small businesses out of business through non-payment then dragging out a lawsuit until the owner was broke.
But he sure can whine about countries falling behind on NATO membership dues.
It is not his whining that is the big problem; that’s just an annoying feature. The problem is his naiveté. He seemingly has no idea why NATO exists nor what America gains by being a member. His view of the world is so transactional, he does not comprehend why we should be willing to pay more than any other country, especially given the bang we get from our buck.
Trump continuously mentions the 2% as “paying their fair share” exemplifying his apparent misunderstanding of how NATO functions. Last month he said to the National Guard Association, “I’ll insist that every NATO nation must spend at least 3 percent. You have to go up to 3 percent — 2 percent is the steal of the century, especially as we’re paying for it. You know, we pay for them. It’s just not even believable.” (Italics added)
The 2% is what members commit as a portion of their individual GDPs to their own militaries. No one is giving 2% of their GDP or budget to NATO. This year nearly all NATO countries are at 2% or more with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine—not Trump’s threats—being the driving factor for the increases.
The 2023 US budget allotted $816.7 billion for defense spending. In the same year, NATO’s total budget was a mere $3.59 billion. The U.S. contributed 15.8% of the NATO tab, around $567 million. Did you catch that? The 2023 US contribution to NATO was not 2% of our budget. It was not even 2% of our defense budget; it was .0694%. That’s right, 7/100ths of the defense budget is what NATO cost us. The Pentagon probably spent more on hammers and toilet seats.
The 2023 US GDP was more than $23T against the aforementioned defense budget. If my math is right, we were right on target with between 2-3%. We pay a rounding error for NATO.
Offsetting that miniscule amount are the military contracts US companies get through NATO along with the jobs provided from them. One 2022 estimate was “billions” to US industries like Raytheon, Northrop Grumman, and Lockheed Martin. After this year’s NATO Summit, contracts of $680M for Stinger missiles and $5.5B for Patriot missiles were announced. America’s investment in NATO is an investment in American business and workers.
NATO membership also means America doesn’t have to send our military to every corner of the globe alone. Writing at Providence Magazine, a Christian review of American foreign policy, Alan Dowd notes,
“NATO allies have stood strong with the United States—helping the U.S. defend South Korea at the beginning of the Cold War and liberate Kuwait at the end, helping the U.S. end a war and keep the peace in the Balkans, helping the U.S. avenge 9/11 and prevent a second 9/11, helping the U.S. fight terrorists and tyrants in Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq.
[…]
British, French, Italian, Spanish, German, and Canadian assets are at work in the Indo-Pacific deterring our common foe and serving as force multipliers for America’s military; French and British aircraft joined U.S. forces shielding Israel from Iran’s missile-drone salvo in April; warships from eight NATO navies lead the operation protecting international shipping from Houthi attacks; more than 70 percent of the alliance has hit the 2-percent-of-GDP standard; Poland will spend 5 percent of GDP on defense next year; Sweden has doubleddefense spending since 2020; Germany has almost doubled defense spending since 2022; France is increasing defense spending by 40 percent between now and 2030; European defense spending increased by 11 percent last year.
[…]
[O]ur European allies have sent more aid to Ukraine than Americans have; Germany has delivered tanks, missile defenses, artillery shells and howitzers; Britain has shipped Ukraine anti-tank systems, anti-air systems, precision-guided missiles, air defenses, tanks and artillery; Denmark and the Netherlands have sent F-16s to Ukraine; France has delivered tanks and missiles to Ukraine; Turkey has sent Ukraine attack drones; Poland has taken in nearly 2 million refugees.” [links in original]
After the NATO summit earlier this year, the White House issued a statement that read in part, “NATO is a defensive alliance. Its main purpose is to prevent war, not to wage it. Allies do this by keeping our defenses strong.” How strong? Per the Department of Defense,
“NATO’s members have a collective defense budget that’s north of $1.2 trillion. NATO nations share advanced training, tactics, equipment and often, weapons platforms. There are also NATO’s overflight agreements, basing arrangements, intelligence-sharing protocols, common command structures and day-to-day familiarity with each other. Critically, NATO can maintain and sustain its forces.
And about those troop numbers: The 32 NATO nations together have about 3,368,000 active-duty personnel, and each NATO nation has its own reserve forces, along with some paramilitary formations. This is deterrence in the flesh.”
The Conservative position should be don’t get rid of a longstanding defense institution unless we have something better to replace it. “Pay up or else” is not the Conservative position; it’s the Corleone position. Whether NATO really is “all that,” I’m not smart enough to say. But after 75 years perhaps there should be more proof that it isn’t.
What I do know is NATO has been around since before I was born. There has been no World War 3 in my lifetime, despite there being two world wars in a span shorter than my lifetime in the decades before my birth. I was not drafted into the service to fight a war in Europe. My children were not drafted to fight a war in Europe. The purpose for which NATO was conceived has held. Soviet expansion into Europe was checked and the Union no longer exists. That Donald Trump, even after serving four years as president, cannot grasp the relationship of NATO to America’s security is not surprising. He is not an astute man. He is naïve as his petty blathering about NATO reveals.
