[…] As it stands, twenty-three NATO members now allocate 2 percent of their GDP to defense, and the European Commission has introduced a “ReArm Europe” initiative to coordinate and support members in defense procurement.
However, if the data available from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) is any indication, almost two-thirds of arms imported by European members of NATO from 2020 to 2024 came from the U.S., a significant increase from the 52% the U.S. accounted for from 2015 to 2019.
Over 90% of the arms imports in Norway, Sweden, Italy, and the Netherlands came from the U.S, while in the case of the U.K., the figure was over 80%. Between 2015 and 2019, less than 10% of Germany’s arms imports came from the U.S., whereas the figure increased to 70% for the period from 2020 to 2024.
Against this background, if European nations increase their own defense production and capabilities, they are likely to become less reliant on importing arms from the United States. […]
As former Australian Prime Minister Malcom Turnbull has written recently in the “Foreign Affairs” magazine, “the long-term solution for U.S. allies is to be able to deter aggressors with capabilities that are sovereign, ideally in the sense that they have been produced domestically but certainly in the sense that they can be deployed and operated without the concurrence of the United States. At the moment, that is not possible. U.S.-supplied F-35s, for instance, are so functionally dependent on American software and spare parts that it is difficult to see how they could be used, or used for long, without Washington’s consent. […]
Paris believes that the example of France and Germany collaborating to form Airbus in 1970, which challenged Boeing’s monopoly, is a good example in this regard.
Reportedly, Portugal is no longer planning to acquire F-35s, and Canada is reassessing its plans to purchase 88 F-35s. Läs artikel