President Joe Biden claims to have helped strengthen NATO, the transatlantic alliance that relies heavily on the United States, but it was only after war broke out in eastern Europe that allies began to take defense spending commitments seriously.
Biden has repeatedly boasted that he made NATO stronger than former President Donald Trump, helping to expand the alliance and restore its reputation on the world stage. But while NATO member states cut their defense spending under Biden, the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine war prompted the alliance to ultimately increase spending. according to In official alliance documents. (Related article: “It's really annoying”: World outraged by Biden aides orchestrating “disastrous” debate)
During a debate with former President Donald Trump on Thursday, Biden claimed NATO was “strong” under his administration, boasted that he had “50 countries around the world supporting Ukraine” and warned that he would pull out of the alliance if Trump was re-elected.
ATLANTA, GEORGIA – JUNE 27: U.S. President Joe Biden (R) and Republican presidential candidate and former U.S. President Donald Trump participate in the CNN presidential debate at CNN Studios in Atlanta, Georgia on June 27, 2024. President Biden and former President Trump will face off in the first debate of the 2024 presidential election. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
His comments echo statements made weeks and months ago, when he claimed his administration was responsible for NATO's success.
“Trump wants to gut NATO. He thinks NATO is useless,” Biden said. Said “NATO is considerably stronger than when I took office. I built it. We've not only re-established the fact that NATO is the strongest alliance in the history of the world, but we've expanded it,” TIME said in a June interview.
“America is a founding member of NATO,” Biden says Said “Today, we have made NATO stronger than it has ever been before,” he said in his State of the Union address in March.
NATO member states are now spending more on defense than they did in the past decade. As part of their alliance agreement, all NATO members, which include Britain, Canada and European Union countries, are required to spend at least 2% of their gross domestic product on defense.
“I worked really hard and put in hours and hours and hours,” Biden said. Said Speaking about NATO in a May interview with Howard Stern, Stern thanked him for working to strengthen the alliance, saying, “And if we hadn't done that, I think we would have seen the beginning of the collapse of NATO.”
According to NATO defense spending, 23 of 32 countries are expected to achieve the 2% minimum in 2024, up from 10 countries the previous year.
The spending surge comes at a time when the Russia-Ukraine war has engulfed Eastern European nations and left allies worried that Moscow will target them next.Before and immediately after the Russia war, fewer NATO members were meeting spending targets under Biden than under Trump.
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg (left) shakes hands with US President Donald Trump (centre) next to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (right) during a family photo session as part of the NATO summit at the Globe Hotel in Watford, northeast London, on December 4, 2019. (Photo by Christian Hartmann/Pool/AFP via Getty Images)
According to the alliance's defense spending, just seven NATO countries met their spending targets in 2022, up from six in 2021. Nine countries met their spending targets in 2020, Trump's final year in office.
During his presidency, Trump frequently pressured NATO allies to meet defense spending targets, threatening to withdraw from the alliance if they didn't. The number of NATO countries that met their spending targets more than doubled from the start of Trump's term to its end, but then fell after Biden took office in 2021, according to spending data.
“The only reason he can bargain with NATO is because I got NATO to give hundreds of billions of dollars. I said, and he's right, 'No, if NATO doesn't pay, we're not going to help them. We're not going to do that,'” Trump said during Thursday's debate. “And you know what happened? Billions of dollars started pouring in the next day and over the next few months. But now we're in the same position. We're the ones paying everybody's bills.”
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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