President renews criticism of allies’ military spending before summit in Turkey

Emily Smith

Foreign Breaking News Reporter

Emily covers breaking news from all over the world. She previously reported on home news and politics for The Telegraph. You can reach her at emily.smith@telegraph.co.uk 

Published 03 July 2026

Donald Trump has said it would be “ridiculous” for the United States to maintain its “one-sided” approach to Nato.

The US president highlighted the gap between America and its allies’ contribution to the alliance just days before world leaders meet for a Nato summit in Turkey.

Mr Trump has repeatedly warned that Nato members risk losing US security guarantees if they do not spend more on defence.

Sir Keir Starmer finally laid out Britain’s defence investment plan on Tuesday, after a year-long delay, announcing an additional £15bn on top of his £298bn military spending plans for the next four years.

Most of the money was found by cancelling or delaying projects, including those in energy, infrastructure and military housing, but there is still around £5bn to be found.

It means UK military spending will reach only 2.69 per cent of GDP by 2030, far behind Germany’s 3.7 per cent and Poland’s 4.48 per cent.

Writing on Truth Social, Mr Trump shared a graph of Nato defence spending alongside the caption: “Ridiculous for the USA to continue along this one-sided path when the relationship is not reciprocal. They were not there for us!!!”

On Thursday, The Telegraph revealed that Russia was planning an “armed provocation” on Polish soil to test Nato’s resolve.

Washington has issued several warnings to Warsaw about the plot, sources close to Karol Nawrocki, the Polish president, told Onet, the Polish news outlet, which, along with The Telegraph, is owned by Axel Springer and is part of its Global Reporters Network.

The upcoming Nato summit will be held in Ankara next week where Mr Trump will expect members to set out a “credible path” to spending 5 per cent of economic output on defence by 2035.

All Nato member states now spend at least 2 per cent of their GDP on defence, a target originally set by Mr Trump.

The summit will bring Nato leaders together for the first time since Mr Trump warned that he was considering withdrawing the US from Nato in a row over a perceived lack of support among allies for his war in Iran.

At the beginning of the conflict, the US president told The Telegraph he was strongly considering pulling his country out of Nato after it failed to join the war.

Branding the alliance a “paper tiger”, Mr Trump said removing the US from the defence treaty was now “beyond reconsideration” after a handful of European allies blocked American warplanes from using their bases and airspace and rejected his demand to send warships to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

The president has frequently criticised Nato allies, accusing them of not paying their fair share of the Nato defence budget.

Mr Trump’s post, indicating that the US spends much more on Nato than other members, appears to conflate overall US military spending with Nato contributions.

According to Nato estimates, the US spent $980bn on defence in 2025, however that figure reflects total American defence expenditure, rather than money to support Nato.

Nato also measures members’ defence commitments as a share of national GDP, rather than by overall spend. This means that, relatively, Poland was the alliance’s largest contributor in 2025, allocating around 4.5 per cent of GDP, compared with the estimated 3.2 per cent for the US.

In any case, Britain is falling behind. In 2014, Germany invested only €35bn (£30bn) in defence, about a third less than Britain.

Since then, Germany has more than tripled its military expenditure to €106.9bn last year, outspending Britain by over 25 per cent, and achieving the biggest defence budget in Europe.

Friedrich Merz, the German chancellor, has secured a constitutional amendment to exempt defence spending from the legal limit on government debt. In principle, that removes any ceiling on how much Germany might invest.

“In view of the threats to our freedom and peace on our continent, the rule for our defence now has to be ‘whatever it takes,’ Mr Merz said last year.

Money is no constraint on Germany’s military expansion – the only limitations are recruitment, industrial capacity and political will.

‘Pay-to-play model’

Mr Trump is considering a shake-up of Nato designed to punish members that do not meet his funding demands.

The US president is examining a “pay-to-play model” that could block allies from decision-making, including when the bloc goes to war.

Under the proposals being considered by Mr Trump, Nato allies that do not meet the new target could be frozen out of decisions on expansion, joint missions and triggering the Article 5 mutual defence clause.

Mr Trump also told the president of the European Commission in 2020 that the US would “never come help” if Europe was attacked.

A senior European commissioner revealed the exchange between the US president and Ursula von der Leyen at the World Economic Forum in Davos in which he told her: “You need to understand that if Europe is under attack we will never come to help you and to support you.”

Original article, copiously illustrated, can be seen here :

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2026/07/03/trump-keeping-up-one-sided-support-nato-ridiculous/?recomm_id=69cf4968-c52a-417f-9a96-0d3db00e4f18