After London and Berlin, Tokyo and Rome temporize their defense budget ambitions

During the first months following the start of the Russian offensive in Ukraine, many countries, in Europe and elsewhere, announced significant increases in their defense effort, in order to cope with the reorganization of the threat and the geopolitics world. Thus, on February 27, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced to the Bundestag the implementation of a €100 billion envelope to finance the Bundeswehr's critical equipment files, as well as the rapid increase in the German defense to reach, and even exceed, 2% of GDP. Following this, many other countries, hitherto reluctant to increase their defense effort, also committed themselves to such a dynamic, from the Netherlands to Spain, via Belgium and Italy. Across the Channel, Defense Secretary Ben Wallace even announced that he intended increase UK defense budget to 3% of GDP and £100bn.

Since then, water has passed under the bridge it seems, because many governments have undertaken to delay the announcements made in the spring of 2022. It is true that, since then, the Ukrainian forces have not only resisted the offensive Russian, but also considerably eroded the conventional military potential of the Kremlin, to the point that now, the Russian ogre who was thought capable of seizing Poland in just 4 days, appears much less impressive and threatening, beyond the strategic dimension which remains more than problematic. In fact, in Berlin, the most recent announcements suggest that while the government is still aiming to increase the defense effort to 2% of GDP, this objective will be achieved over a much longer schedule than initially envisaged. Moreover, the 2023 budget of the German armies will be very close to that of 2022, i.e. 1,6% of GDP.

In London, the change of government, and the serious economic difficulties which the administration of Rishi Sunak must face, led to pure and simple abandonment of the ambitions put forward by Ben Wallace a few months earlier, even if the latter retained his ministry in the new government. The objective of a defense effort at 3% of GDP and more than £100 billion is therefore over. London has undertaken, through the voice of Finance Minister Jeremy Hunt, to keep the British defense effort "at the above 2%" in accordance with NATO commitments. The same now applies to Italy, which had announced in April an increase in the defense budget of €12 billion by 2028 to reach the 2% threshold required, but whose 2023 budget in preparation does not provide for any increase in the budget devoted to armies or acquisitions, and a defense effort which will remain around 1,5%.

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