Three percent of GDP for defense? The Polish proposal is too ambitious, it sounds from Washington and Prague

The member states of the North Atlantic Alliance are obliged to set aside 2% of their gross domestic product (GDP) for defence. It is their own defense, they do not contribute to any common budget. The money thus remains with the member states.

However, according to data published by NATO in February, only 11 of the alliance’s 32 member countries are fulfilling this commitment. Among them are the United States, Great Britain or Poland.

“The Russian Federation has switched its economy to war mode. It allocates almost 30% of its annual budget to armaments,” explains Duda’s request. “In the face of the war in Ukraine and the growing imperial ambitions of Russia, the countries forming NATO must act boldly and uncompromisingly,” he added.

Even ex-president and Republican candidate for the next president of the United States, Donald Trump, considers keeping one’s commitments to be crucial. According to him, the US will remain a pillar of the alliance’s defense. “But the U.S. should simply pay its fair share, not everyone else’s.” as he told reporters.

Although he partially retracted his unfortunate statement from an election rally in South Carolina, where he said he would encourage Russia to attack “non-payers”, however, the requirement remains.

Poland is trying to set an example. With a defense budget of close to 4% of GDP, it is a premium in this parameter in the alliance. That is also why we would like other states to progress to at least 3%. However, it apparently does not yet have support for increasing the mandatory commitment.

On March 26, the Polish president also presented the proposal to the President of the United States, Joe Biden. According to Euronews, Biden indicated that wanting to increase the commitment to 3% for all members of the alliance was too ambitious. At least for now.

And similarly to the USA, the Czech Republic is also considering a possible request. “We know that we would have projects for three percent, but we have our feet on the ground,” Minister of Defense Jana Černochová (ODS) told Bleska. According to her, it is important that the Czech Republic manages to meet the mentioned current obligation.

“The law enshrines defense spending of at least 2%, and I am glad that we managed to enforce the law. We thus fulfilled our government promise and commitment to our NATO allies,” adds Černochová. It is said that the proposal for an increase beyond this framework will happen if the Czech Republic is doing well economically.

Enshrining the obligation in law was achieved last year by amending the Defense Financing Act. It will definitely not be possible to finance only weapons and ammunition from the chapter. 2% can also “fall” on the repair of strategic roads or diesel stocks for crisis situations.