One lawmaker on Wednesday questioned why the U.S. is quadrupling its emergency investment in defending Europe from Russian aggression when NATO allies in Europe aren’t meeting their defense spending goals.
“It blows me away that of the 28 NATO member countries, only five have met a minimal threshold of 2 percent, while we’re spending near 4 percent,” said Rep. Beto O’Rourke, D-Texas, noting that only one Baltic state has met the goal of spending 2 percent of its gross domestic product on defense. “We are creating a moral hazard by upping an investment from $789 million to $3.4 billion without a concurrent commitment in real dollars or euros from our allies on the continent.”
The House Armed Services Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations held a hearing on Wednesday looking at the European Reassurance Initiative, for which the president requested $3.4 billion in his fiscal 2017 budget. The initiative includes military deployments and exercises in the region.
Defense Secretary Ash Carter has said that urging other NATO members to meet the spending goal set at the Wales Summit is a top priority. Senators on the other side of the Capitol have also criticized NATO allies for not contributing their fair share.
The lack of contributions by allies is one reason Donald Trump has called NATO “obsolete” and threatened to leave the alliance if allies don’t step up their contributions.
Rep. Seth Moulton, D-Mass., asked Maj. Gen. David Allvin, the director of strategy and policy at U.S. European Command, if NATO should be dismantled.
“No. Absolutely not. I could go on for minutes or hours,” Allvin said.
“You’re preaching to the choir here, we just unfortunately have a major party candidate here who thinks that’s a good idea,” Moulton interrupted him.
Other members of Congress wondered whether the European Reassurance Initiative funding should be rolled into the base budget in future years to give the Defense Department greater stability and ability to plan.
“While drawing from these funds provides near-term flexibility and responsiveness, relying on such year-to-year appropriations does not allow the Department of Defense to confidently plan or implement an evolving strategy in the region,” Rep. Vicky Hartzler, R-Mo., and chairwoman of the subcommittee, said during her opening statement.
To help solve the problem, Hartzler said the House-passed fiscal 2017 defense appropriations bill moves $2.2 billion of the $3.4 billion request into the base budget to show Congress’ continued support of the initiative.
