The UK government will spend 2.5% of GDP on defence by 2030, Boris Johnson has announced, as NATO’s secretary general warned that the alliance must stand up to Vladimir Putin.
Speaking from the NATO conference in Madrid, the prime minister told broadcasters that “we need to invest for the long-term in vital capabilities like future combat air, whilst simultaneously adapting to a more dangerous and more competitive world”.
“The logical conclusion of the investments on which we propose to embark, these decisions, is that we’ll reach 2.5% of GDP on defence by the end of the decade,” he continued.
Mr Johnson said the spending targets set by NATO members a decade ago – with every country pledging to spend 2% of GDP on defence – “were then set for a very different era”.
“What we’re saying is that we want Jens Stoltenberg, the [NATO] secretary general, to start work on that new target now – and he’s agreed to do that.”
The PM added that “the cost of freedom is always worth paying”.
He spoke after NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said the alliance’s boost in troop numbers on its eastern flank was to ensure Russia’s president does not miscalculate or misunderstand allies’ readiness to act.
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“We live in the more dangerous world, and we live in the more unpredictable world, and we live in a world where we have actually got war going on in Europe with large scale military operations,” he said.
“We also know this can get worse because if this becomes a full scale war between Russia and NATO, then we see suffering damage, death, destruction at this scale, which is much, much worse than what we see in Ukraine.”
