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US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has said Europe must take the lead on building out a revamped “NATO 3.0” and creating a “real, hardline military alliance”.
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Hegseth made the comments while speaking ahead of a meeting with his NATO counterparts in Brussels on Thursday.
“NATO 3.0 is post-Cold War recognition that needs to go back to a real, hardline military alliance that has real military capabilities capable of deterring right here on the continent and taking the lead for the conventional defense of Europe,” Hegseth said.
US president Donald Trump has repeatedly pushed for European NATO allies to divert more money to defense spending and has signaled his intention to scale back the United States’ role in the alliance, as he turns his attention more to China and the Indo-Pacific region.
In May, Washington reportedly told NATO members it would reduce the number of bombers, fighter jets, warships and other military assets destined for the alliance.
Trump has also threatened to pull troops out of Germany amid a dispute with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and then from Poland – before eventually appearing to reverse his decision and announcing that he would deploy an additional 5,000 forces to Poland.
NATO members committed at the Hague Summit last year to investing 5% of GDP annually on core defense and wider defence-and security-related areas by 2035, and Hegseth said that while many had followed through, some “still need to do more”.
“We will be candid about that both in private and in public,” he told reporters on Thursday, while also touting Trump’s proposed $1.5 trillion defense budget as a “message to the world.”
Hegseth said such investments were crucial to the US’s military capabilities and “building the arsenal of freedom that first and foremost protects America and American interests but also backstops the strength of NATO and our allies”.