President Donald Trump claimed on Twitter Saturday morning that fellow NATO member states are going to increase defense payments after he lectured them on their inadequate spending this week.
Many NATO countries have agreed to step up payments considerably, as they should. Money is beginning to pour in- NATO will be much stronger.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 27, 2017
This comes after Trump lectured leaders of fellow NATO countries to their faces on May 25, saying, “We should recognize that with these chronic underpayments and growing threats, even 2% of GDP is insufficient to closing gaps in modernizing readiness and the size of forces. We have to make up for the many years lost.”
“This is not fair to the people and taxpayers of the United States, and many of these nations owe massive amounts of money from past years,” Trump added.
What the president referred to is the NATO agreement that sets a guideline that members should spend 2 percent of their gross domestic product (GDP) on defense. Currently, only five members out of 28 are doing that.
This means that the United States is paying more than its fair share of costs for the alliance. Trump did not specify which countries would pay more.
