Europe’s biggest military powers are drawing up plans to take on greater responsibilities for the continent’s defence from the United States, including a pitch to the administration of President Donald Trump, for a managed transfer over the next five to 10 years, according to a new report.
The United Kingdom, France, Germany and the Nordic countries are among those engaged in the informal but structured discussions that would reshape the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) security bloc, The Financial Times newspaper reported on Thursday, citing four European officials involved.
The news also comes as Bloomberg News reported on Friday that NATO will ask Europe and Canada to boost its weapons and equipment stockpiles by 30 percent, amid its political infighting with the US and Trump’s repeated threats to withdraw from the bloc.
According to the FT report, the talks are an attempt to avoid possible chaos should the US unilaterally declare its withdrawal from the transatlantic security alliance that has protected Europe for the past 80 years.
The Europeans reportedly want to present the plan to the US ahead of NATO’s annual leaders’ summit in The Hague in June.
US role
At present, the US contributes 15.8 percent to the NATO yearly expenditure of $3.5bn. It also deploys between 80,000 to 100,000 soldiers across Europe, making its role indispensable for the continent’s security.
European countries like Germany, France and the UK have already announced they will increase their defence spending and investments in its military.
Quoting government officials, the FT report said it would take an estimated five to 10 years of increased spending to raise European capabilities to a level “where they could replace most US competences”.
“Increasing spending is the only play that we have: burden sharing and shifting the dial away from US reliance,” one of the officials was quoted by the FT as saying. “We’re starting those talks but it’s such a big task that many are overwhelmed by the scale of it.”
However, the report said that some officials still believe Trump is just making some rhetoric, and that he does not really intend to make significant changes in the alliance. Others are asking whether Europe can still trust the US under Trump.
Since Trump won the election in November last year and returned to office earlier this year, European countries have been scrambling to boost defence spending and rethink their military positioning, amid increasing assertiveness from Russia.
Bloomberg reported that five main areas being targeted in the next period are air defence systems, deep-fire capacities, logistics, communication and information systems, and land manoeuvre capacities.
“Air defence systems were specifically singled out as an area that require more capability from all allies, including the US,” the report added.
