ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — NATO on Tuesday will showcase a series of new military projects worth billions of dollars in an attempt to convince U.S. President Donald Trump that the allies are stepping up defense spending and converting investment into real firepower.
At an event dubbed the “big reveal,” several leaders are due to announce new deals with defense companies, plenty of them in the United States. Trump has branded NATO a “paper tiger” that would
cease to function without American arms and leadership.
“We will announce tens of billions in new contracts that will provide the crucial kit we need to deter and defend,” NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte told reporters on the eve of the military alliance’s two-day summit in Turkey.
The defense industry splash comes a few weeks after Rutte tried to ease U.S. concerns about military spending at NATO with a new pitch using a chart labeled the “The Trump Trillion” — showing $1.2 trillion in spending by European allies and Canada since 2017.
Far from being impressed, Trump appeared unmoved, saying he was still disappointed at some NATO allies’ refusal to join the Iran war, which he had launched alongside Israel without consulting them.
“We don’t need their money — we don’t need anything,” Trump said. “I just want loyalty.”
Among the contracts to be unveiled, many of them drawn up and some signed long before the summit, is expected to be one to replace NATO’s aging fleet of surveillance planes.
NATO as an organization does not own any weaponry — these are the property of the 32 member countries — but it does have a fleet of AWACs aircraft that are about 50 years old and some newer surveillance drones.
Some of the other projects will notably be paid for with funds from a system of cheap loans for defense purposes set up by the European Union, comprising up to $170 billion raised on capital markets.
“We need to ensure that we are translating our economic might into military capabilities, putting the cash to work from defense plans to drones, from money to missiles and interceptors,” Rutte said.
The summit is being held in President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s sprawling palace compound in Ankara and Trump has suggested he would come bearing gifts for the Turkish leader.
But speaking Monday on the morning show “Fox & Friends,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urged the U.S. not to sell F-35 fighter jets to Turkey, saying that Erdogan “calls openly for the annihilation of Israel.” Turkey and Israel have acrimonious relations. Erdogan frequently accuses Israel of committing genocide in its war in Gaza, triggered by the deadly Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack on southern Israel.
Turkey was barred from the F-35 program in 2019, after it purchased Russian-made S-400 missile defense systems. However, Trump, who has warm relations with Erdogan, has hinted ahead of his planned visit to Ankara for the NATO summit that the sales could soon resume.
Netanyahu said selling Turkey F-35s would “upset the power balance in the Middle East, which is ultimately guaranteed by Israeli air superiority and also, I think, by America’s posture in the Middle East.”
Israel’s Air Force depends on hundreds of U.S. fighter jets, including F-35s, F-16s and F-15s.
The focus of the summit is a stronger Europe for a stronger NATO. The Trump administration has warned the allies that they must handle Europe’s security alone as the United States focuses on China and the Indo-Pacific region.
The Pentagon wants a reboot and is promoting what it calls “NATO 3.0,” a vision of the alliance in which Europe assumes greater responsibility for its own defense, freeing the U.S. to concentrate on other priorities.
But hiking defense spending means increasing taxes or diverting resources from other priorities. U.K. Defense Secretary John Healey unexpectedly quit last month, saying the government was not willing to spend at a time of rising threats.
Concern is mounting among some northern and central eastern countries that Russia might be preparing a hybrid attack — a combination of conventional warfare with tactics like cyberattacks — on the continent as Russian President Vladimir Putin struggles to secure victory in Ukraine.
Keir Starmer’s office said the British leader will be “focused on building a stronger and more European NATO” on what is likely to be his last foreign trip as prime minister.
Starmer, who announced his resignation June 22, has faced criticism from military leaders, opposition politicians and some in his center-left party for the slow rate of increase in U.K. military spending.
His government has committed to reach the NATO budget target of spending 3.5% of gross domestic product on defense by 2035 but does not have a concrete plan to get there. Its current spending plan will see that spending hit 2.7% of GDP by 2029.
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Associated Press writer Jill Lawless in London contributed to this report.
