Political Quotes

“I rise to speak on my amendment No. 1706. This amendment addresses the contributions of the member states to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, in relation to their commitment towards their defense budgets within their economy. At the 2006 NATO summit in Riga, Latvia, which I was honored to be able to attend, NATO member countries committed to spend a minimum of 2 percent of their national income, GDP, on defense. Furthermore, at the 2014 NATO summit in Wales, NATO member countries agreed again that ``allies currently meeting the NATO guideline to spend a minimum of 2 percent of their gross domestic product on defense will aim to continue to do so''. They went on to state that ``allies whose current proportion of GDP spent on defense is below this level will: halt any decline in defense expenditure; aim to increase defense expenditure in real terms as GDP grows; aim to move towards the 2 percent guideline within a decade with a view to meeting their NATO Capability Targets and filling NATO's capability shortfall.'' Well, I suggest that is a pretty weak commitment, but it remains a commitment. It certainly can be stretched out, and they are already failing too often to meet those commitments. So, in 2015, only 4 this year--only 4 out of the 28 NATO-member countries, including the United States, meet the 2-percent target. That is 4 out of the 28.…”