On June 25, NATO leaders agreed at their annual summit on a goal of spending five percent of their gross domestic product on defense, more than doubling the old two-percent target. It’s unclear how many members will actually reach this goal. Even the target relies on some creative accounting: of the five percent, only 3.5 percent is pledged to what officials call “pure” defense spending, with the remainder going to security and defense-related “critical infrastructure.”
Ahead of the NATO summit, The New Yorker published “Collective Punishment: Why is Donald Trump upending America’s commitment to NATO?” a story by contributing writer Joshua Yaffa, the author of the 2021 Orwell Prize-winning book “Between Two Fires: Truth, Ambition, and Compromise in Putin’s Russia.” In his new article, Yaffa describes how the looming threats of Russian aggression and American withdrawal are pressuring European leaders to reassess their approach to NATO and their broader defense strategies. He joined this episode of The Naked Pravda to discuss the story.
Timestamps for this episode:
- (3:09) Donald Trump’s impact
- (6:47) European defense spending and strategic shifts
- (15:25) Challenges in European military procurement
- (19:46) Political and social implications of increased defense spending
- (25:40) NATO’s bureaucracy and future planning
- (31:27) Managing the U.S. withdrawal
- (32:43) NATO military exercises and preparedness
- (35:52) The Russian threat and NATO’s response
- (43:57) The future of NATO and U.S.–European relations
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Sound editing by Kevin Rothrock