BRUSSELS (AP) 鈥� NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte insisted Monday that Europe is incapable of defending itself without U.S. military support and would have to more than double current military to be able to do so.
鈥淚f anyone thinks here 鈥� that the European Union or Europe as a whole can defend itself without the U.S., keep on dreaming. You can鈥檛,鈥� Rutte told EU lawmakers in Brussels. Europe and the United States 鈥渘eed each other,鈥� he said.
Tensions are festering within NATO over U.S. President Donald Trump鈥檚 in recent weeks to annex Greenland, which is a semiautonomous territory of NATO ally Denmark.
Trump also said that he was slapping new tariffs on Greenland’s European backers, but later after a 鈥渇ramework鈥� for a deal over the mineral-rich island was reached, with Rutte’s help. Few details of the agreement have emerged.
The 32-nation military organization is bound together by a mutual defense clause, of NATO鈥檚 founding Washington treaty, which commits every country to come to the defense of an ally whose territory is under threat.
At NATO鈥檚 summit in The Hague in July, European allies 鈥� with the exception of Spain 鈥� plus Canada agreed to Trump鈥檚 demand that they invest the same percentage of their economic output on defense as the United States within a decade.
They pledged to spend 3.5% of gross domestic product on core defense, and a further 1.5% on security-related infrastructure 鈥� a total of 5% of GDP 鈥� by 2035.
鈥淚f you really want to go it alone,鈥� Rutte said, 鈥渇orget that you can ever get there with 5%. It will be 10%. You have to build up your own nuclear capability. That costs billions and billions of euros.鈥�
France has led calls for Europe to build its and support for its stance has grown since the Trump administration that its security priorities lie elsewhere and that the Europeans would have to fend for themselves.
Rutte told the lawmakers that without the United States, Europe 鈥渨ould lose the ultimate guarantor of our freedom, which is the U.S. nuclear umbrella. So, hey, good luck!鈥�
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