Spain Remains the Only NATO Country Not Backing 5% Defense Spending Goal

Spain is the only NATO member that has not endorsed a plan for the entire Alliance to commit to spending 5% of GDP on defense by 2032, according to the Financial Times.

Madrid is under growing pressure to support the target, which would allow NATO to present a unified commitment at the defense ministers’ meeting in Brussels on June 5.

The 5% threshold has become a key demand of U.S. President Donald Trump, who has warned he may withdraw U.S. protection from countries that fail to meet the target.

Diplomats are racing to secure unanimous backing for the pledge ahead of a NATO summit in The Hague on June 24. Many allies hope the commitment will persuade Trump to maintain U.S. security guarantees for Europe.

However, Spanish officials have not confirmed their support. Without Spain’s endorsement, the Alliance would be unable to issue a unified statement, potentially weakening internal cohesion and complicating summit preparations.

The proposal, put forward by NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, outlines that 3.5% of the 5% should go to core defense expenditures, while the remaining 1.5% would cover areas such as cybersecurity and defense-related infrastructure. Members would aim to meet the full target by 2032.

FT notes that no NATO member currently spends 5% of GDP on defense under the current Alliance criteria. However, two officials shared that the 3.5% benchmark is more significant, as most NATO countries already spend roughly 1.5% on ancillary defense categories.

Bernardo Navazo, founder of the Madrid-based consultancy Geopolitical Insights, said that it will be very difficult for countries like Spain and Italy to gain 5% support from their populations in an environment where people do not feel directly threatened, even if leaders say the EU faces a security threat from Russia.

NATO defense spending trends

NATO members agreed to raise defense spending to 2% of GDP at the Warsaw summit in 2016.

As of 2024, 23 of the 32 NATO members have met that target, a notable increase from 2022, when only seven had done so. Overall, defense spending among NATO allies rose more than 33% in real terms from 2022 to 2024.

Despite spending more on defense than any other NATO country, the United States is the only member whose defense spending as a share of GDP has declined over the past decade.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, that trend is expected to continue, with spending projected to fall from 2.9% of GDP in 2025 to 2.4% in 2035.