(Adnkronos) – The United States has a “clear” intention to reduce its commitment to Nato in Europe, meaning that the continent needs to “invest in security” to create a greater military balance with Russia and stronger guarantees for peace, foreign minister Antonio Tajani said on Friday.
“It seems clear to me that the United States intends to reduce its commitment to NATO in Europe,” Tajani told reporters on the sidelines of the Conference of the Consuls of Italy in the world at the foreign ministry in Rome.
“We have decided to increase spending on security because the more secure we are, the more we guarantee peace,” Tajani said.
“When there is no balance, peace is at risk. So we must ensure there is a balance between Europe, the West, and the Russian Federation from a military and other perspectives,” Tajani added.
Security “means much more” than weapons, Tajani stated.
Infrastructure, cyber security, and territorial control are part of security, Tajani underlined.
On Thursday, premier Giorgia Meloni said told lawmakers that Italy would increase its spending on defence and security this year by 0.71 percent from 2025 to around 2.8 percent of GDP (gross domestic product).
Most of the increase will come from spending linked to domestic security, including some police duties, using Nato rules allowing the inclusion of items in the defence and security budget that were previously excluded.
The transformation of warfare by the use of drones, satellites and data mean that Nato allies need to rethink military priorities, Meloni stated.
The war in Ukraine has shown that military power can no longer be measured just by traditional weapon systems or headline spending, Meloni said.
Tanks “costing millions of euros” are being destroyed by drones “costing an average 20,000 euros”, she noted.
US president Donald Trump has urged European and Asian allies to raise core defence spending to 3.5 percent of GDP and has repeatedly accused European governments of relying too heavily on US firepower and of underinvesting in their own militaries.
At the 2025 NATO Summit in The Hague, Allies made a commitment to investing 5 percent GDP annually on core defence requirements and defence- and security-related spending by 2035.
