At the same time, a closer look at NATO funding also underlines that – as is the case with the United Nations – the U.S. contributes more than one-fifth of the direct, collective funding that keeps NATO’s military and civilian operations on track. Member countries contribute in line with an agreed cost-sharing formula, based on Gross National Income. (GNI equals GDP plus income obtained in dividends, interest etc. from other countries.) Under that formula, the U.S. contributes 22.144 percent of the NATO budget, followed by Germany (14.65 percent), France (10.63 percent) and Britain (9.84 percent). Thirteen allies, mostly smaller former communist countries that joined the alliance after the fall of the Soviet Union and disintegration of Yugoslavia, pay less than one percent each – Albania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech, Estonia, Hungary, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Portugal, Slovakia and Slovenia.
(Graph: CNSNews.com/Data: NATO)
The national contributions go towards NATO’s military costs, civilian costs and the NATO Security Investment Program (NSIP), which deals with investment in command and control systems etc. For 2017, NATO’s military budget is 1.29 billion euro ($1.38 billion), the civilian budget is 234.4 million euro ($252 million), and the NSIP budget ceiling is 655 million euro ($704 million).
Two percent pledge an indicator of ‘political will to contribute’ to missions
The president’s tweeted message about Germany owing “vast sums of money to NATO” likely relates to a related but separate issue, dealing with indirect contributions. NATO describes these as contributions that are made, for example, when “a member volunteers equipment or troops to a military operation and bears the costs of the decision to do so.” In order to encourage and allow for such contributions, members agreed in 2014, and reaffirmed at a summit last year, on a commitment for each to spend at least two percent of GDP on defense spending, by 2024. Impacting NATO’s indirect rather than direct funding, the target is intended to be “an indicator of a country’s political will to contribute” to common defense efforts. It is also meant to send a signal to the rest of the world that the alliance is a credible entity.
(Graph: CNSNews.com/Data: NATO)
The United States has met the target, and dedicated 3.36 percent of GDP (around $664 billion, according to NATO figures) to military spending in 2016. Germany has not, having devoted 1.20 percent of GDP on defense (about $41.6 billion) last year. In fact, only five of the 28 NATO allies have made the grade: Aside from the U.S., the other four were Greece (2.36 percent in 2016, amounting to $4.6 billion), Estonia (2.18 percent, $503 million), Britain (2.17 percent, $56.8 billion) and Poland (2.01 percent, $12.7 billion). NATO’s other North American member, Canada, spent 1.02 percent on defense last year ($15.5 billion), while the average across its European members was 1.47 percent. Closest to achieving the target were France (1.79 percent, $44.2 billion) and Turkey (1.69 percent, $12.1 billion); lagging farthest behind were Luxembourg (0.42 percent, $248 million), Belgium (0.91 percent, $4.3 billion) and Spain (0.90 percent, $11.2 billion).
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