Thursday in Brussels, speaking in front of the new NATO Headquarters, President Donald Trump said many NATO member nations “owe massive amounts of money,” towards NATO’s defense budget.

Therefore, he said they “must finally contribute their fair share and meet their financial obligations.”

Trump said, “I have been very direct with Secretary Stoltenberg and members of the alliance in saying NATO members must finally contribute their fair share and meet their financial obligations. But 23 of the 28 member nations are still not paying what they should be paying and what they are supposed to be paying for their defense. This is not fair to the people and taxpayers in the United States, and many of these nations owe massive amounts of money from past years and not paying in those past years. Over the last eight years, the United States spent more on defense than all other NATO countries combined.”

“If all members pay 2% of their GDP on defense last year, we would have had another $119 billion for our collective defense and for the financing of additional NATO reserves,” he continued. “We should recognize that with these chronic under payments and growing threats, even 2% GDP is insufficient to close the gaps in modernizing, readiness and the size of forces. We have to make up for the many years lost. 2% is the bare minimum for confronting today’s very real and very vicious threats. If NATO countries made their full and complete contributions, then NATO would be even stronger than it is today, especially from the threat of terrorism.”

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