Ahead of NATO Summit, Germany Once Again Shirking Defense Commitments

As President Joe Biden heads overseas for a NATO Summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, next week, one topic defense and foreign policy experts will be anxiously awaiting news on is whether or not Biden will demand accountability from German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on his country’s repeated failure to meet its defense spending commitments. If the past two years are any indication, however, Scholz has nothing to worry about.

Biden and Scholz have appeared to develop an especially close bond in recent months, including Scholz taking the unusual step of endorsing Biden over former President Donald Trump in his re-election bid. The German chancellor also phoned Biden on July 4 to discuss “a range of issues” ahead of the NATO Summit.

It was unclear from the readout of the call whether or not one of those issues will be Germany’s continued shortfall in meeting its NATO defense spending goal of 2 percent of the country’s $4.2 trillion GDP. This year, Germany is expected to fall more than $18.5 billion short of that benchmark, even as other NATO countries ramp up their spending to meet the threat of Russian aggression in Ukraine.

NATO members first agreed to the 2 percent GDP goal in 2014, with all countries expected to increase defense spending to that point by next year. In 2022, just seven of 30 NATO member countries met the requirement, and just 11 are expected to hit the target this year.

The U.S. currently spends nearly 3.5 percent of its GDP on defense. The NATO leader in defense spending relative to GDP is Poland, which recently more than doubled its defense spending to nearly 4.5 percent.

Germany’s failure to meet its targets is particularly concerning as it is by far the largest economy in Europe and thus, in terms of dollars, plays an outsize role in Europe’s overall defense posture.

Former President Donald Trump was quick to recognize this glaring issue and wasted no time upon taking office to expose Germany as the most stingy NATO contributor, with defense spending often falling below 1.5 percent of Germany’s GDP. Though prior U.S. presidents had quietly complained about the failure of U.S. allies to meet their commitments, Trump bluntly and publicly made clear that Germany’s freeriding was costing American taxpayers, thrusting the issue to the forefront of the foreign policy conversation.

Trump’s critique proved prescient as Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine. European leaders saw that the war had revealed previously unseen vulnerabilities in Europe’s security system, and even the greatest optimists began to look at Russia with concern.

Germany too pledged to boost its defense spending. Scholz declared that Germany would put the 2 percent goal “in writing,” and created a special fund of roughly $108 billion to raise military spending.

However, those public promises have failed to materialize into long-term results. The special fund remains largely untouched, as does military spending. Following the Russian invasion, the German defense budget actually shrunk, following the tradition of cuts initiated by Chancellor Gerhard Schroder in the early 2000s.

Even with the special fund, Germany is expected to miss its 2 percent target until at least 2027, at which point defense spending will fall back below 1.2 percent of GDP unless the German government takes drastic action.

A report from the German Parliament, or Bundestag, in 2019 paints an alarming picture of the state of readiness of the German military. Troops said they lacked boots, clothing, modern helmets, night vision devices, and protective vests.

Another report from 2023 found that Germany is devoting only 20 percent of the necessary resources to funding new projects, including the procurement of new weapons. Former German Defense Minister Rupert Scholz called the report “catastrophic,” saying that “the entire defense capability of the federal republic is suffering, which is irresponsible.”

Germany is also lacking in manpower, with just 178,000 active-duty personnel. Italy, which has more than 22 million fewer people than Germany, has a fighting force of 183,000.

Meanwhile, it is U.S. taxpayers that have picked up the tab for Germany’s shortfall. There are nearly 40,000 U.S. troops in Germany, infusing billions into the German economy.

Berlin has also been reluctant to back Ukraine with weapons and ammunition, again leaving most of the burden to the United States and other NATO members. In another development that proved former President Donald Trump exactly right, Germany faced a major crisis early in the war as Russia threatened to cut off energy supplies to German cities.

Instead of established economic powerhouses like Germany, it is new NATO members who joined the alliance after the Cold War – which largely make up what former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld called “New Europe” – who are leading the way. Along with Poland, most of these nations like Finland are spending well over 2 percent of their GDP on defense. These countries have also stepped up to come to the aid of Ukraine in its war against Russia.

Throughout all of this, President Biden has taken a remarkably relaxed attitude toward Berlin – an approach that could not be more different from his predecessor. But this enabling of Germany to avoid its defense commitments is likely to continue to yield disastrous results, at the expense of not just Germany, but the entire Western alliance.

Ben Solis is the pen name of an international affairs journalist, historian, and researcher.