Trump Says NATO Allies Don’t Pay Their Share. Is That True?<br />Alexander said that Citing the amount not spent over the years is fine,<br />Trump said that Many of these nations owe massive amounts of money from past years and not paying in those past years,<br />Gary J. Schmitt, a scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, said Mr. Trump was putting it in layman’s terms and "doesn’t care whether it’s technically accurate."<br />But Mr. Schmitt identified two problems: "One, because it’s not technically correct, it is too easily dismissed by the very folks he wants to put pressure on.<br />In 2006, even as the United States was increasing military spending because of the wars in Afghanistan<br />and Iraq, European allies were shrinking their military spending.<br />Jens Stoltenberg, NATO’s secretary general, said last month<br />that the number of alliance members that would meet the 2 percent target next year would rise to eight.<br />In his final policy speech before stepping down in 2011, Mr. Gates said Americans were growing impatient spending money "on behalf of nations<br />that are apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources or make the necessary changes to be serious and capable partners in their own defense." Mr. Obama raised it during a visit to Europe after Russia’s Ukraine intervention.
