Almost ten years after NATO agreed to the 2 percent target, the exit will now take place at the Vilnius summit. NATO President Stoltenberg has already made it clear that the alliance’s defense spending must be increased.

It won’t be a routine meeting today. The Secretary General of NATO made sure of that. Jens Stoltenberg wants to speak clearly with the defense ministers. At the Vilnius summit in four weeks, the allies are expected to commit to increasing defense spending.

The 2% target should play a decisive role in this – but in a different way than before. It no longer has to be a loose guide that you can follow or not follow. Stoltenberg made it clear before talks with ministers that „2% will not be the upper limit we aspire to”. This should be the minimum we have to spend on defense in the future. „

The first runner is Greece

To date, only a small group of member states have been able to invest 2% of their GDP in defense each year. Great Britain is one of those, Poland, the Baltic states and of course the USA. But Greece is the leader – Greeks spend 3.5 percent of their economic power on security. The reason: fears of military attacks from neighboring Türkiye.

However, the majority of NATO member states are more or less below 2%. Germany belongs to this group with about 1.5 percent. That’s a spot at least in midfield, but it’s still quite far from the goal.

Kassensturz almost ten years later

The 2% target was set in 2014 at the NATO summit in Wales. Putin had invaded Crimea – the West took it as a warning to invest more in his own defense after years of détente. Nearly ten years later, the cash register accident is set to happen in Vilnius.

Federal Defense Minister Boris Pistorius was optimistic before the meeting. He is pleased that the 2% target has been set out in the federal government’s new security strategy. “We want to achieve this as early as 2024,” an important signal to NATO allies.

Germany should defense budget increase by a quarter

The Ifo Institute has calculated what the 2% target will mean for Germany in concrete terms. After that, the defense budget should be increased by a quarter, which would amount to an additional 17 billion euros per year. By the way, in NATO the investment amounts are taken into account only when they are actually paid for. This also applies to the federal government’s $100 billion special fund.

The 2% target is not undisputed. For example, if the economy is doing poorly and economic output is declining, the percentage of defense spending increases almost automatically—without spending a single extra cent on security. And just by buying expensive weapons, the defense capacity does not increase in any way.

Discussion about co Defense financing

Europeans know the problem. They spend more than 200 billion euros on armaments every year – but they do it alone mostly nationwide. Having your own gun park with your own tank is still considered a national honor. The consequences are double and triple hulls, as well as interoperability problems for weapon systems at work.

Michael Hauther, director of the German Economics Institute, considers this nonsense in economic terms. He calls on Europe to plan and buy weapons as well. European defense co-financing makes more sense. „You have larger volumes, you can expand and, above all, you can reduce weapon systems and bring them to an acceptable level.” Hawther refers to the United States of America. The world’s largest military power receives much less different weapon systems than European ones.

real European defense union?

From the point of view of the director of the IW, there is a lot to be said for a true European defense union, in which the most efficient and best offer is determined in all branches of arms. This should then be funded jointly by a special purpose tax, rather than relying on costly individual national efforts, as has been the case thus far.

However, even then you will not be able to avoid overspending on defense. „In Helmut Schmidt’s time, more than three percent of GDP was spent on defense in a difficult economic situation with mass unemployment.” However, defense spending could have been financed. „It will be possible now.”