How NATO’s 2025 Summit will change our way of life for the next decades.
Let them eat.... ballistic missiles.
The champagne bottles from June’s 75th NATO summit had barely been recycled when the alliance found itself mired in its perennial existential crisis—the kind that keeps defence analysts employed and European leaders staring at their ceilings at 3 AM.
Then, on Tuesday morning, I woke up at 8:30 AM to NATO’s new Secretary-General Mark Rutte delivering "the daddy comment." My groggy, pre-coffee thought: God, I must still be dreaming—this can’t be happening.
Beyond the meme-worthy "daddy diplomacy" and Europe’s collective moment of realisation, NATO is becoming something far more consequential: an increasingly vital instrument to make Europe pay more for American interests. This reality contrasts sharply with Trump’s first-term theatrics, when he attacked NATO as part of his broader flirtation with authoritarian regimes.
Leaders have agreed to ramp up defence spending to 5% of their countries' economic output by 2035, following months of pressure from Donald Trump. But the context of NATO spending debates has transformed dramatically in the past decade. Financial crises and the COVID-19 pandemic have hit hard national budgets, radically altering fiscal landscapes across member states. Yet some still argue that a mere 0.5% increase in military spending maintains equivalence - even when this funding is stripped from social programs and elderly benefits.
I don’t want to be the bearer of bad news but, 3.5% of the UK’s GDP, is about a third of England’s schools budget. Even if we collectively agree to raise military spending to 5%, there isn’t a single European leader who can credibly explain how to do so without causing a social crisis. The madness speaks for itself, but it may be something that goes beyond just numbers — a change in the paradigm of the economies peoples’ way of life. Here's how:
In 2014, NATO Heads of State and Government agreed to commit 2% of their national Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to defence spending, to help ensure the Alliance's continued military readiness. This decision was taken supposedly in response to Russia’s annexation of Crimea, and amid broader instability in the Middle East but it has always been a priority. This was definitely seen as progress for NATO membership coherence, especially if we think that things were very different in the 1950s and 1960s regarding spending guidelines.
While military investment was substantial after World War II, the emphasis of that era was on rebuilding societies and economies devastated by the conflict. Alongside spending on arms, political capital was poured into multilateralism and diplomacy. Today, however, the debate around military spending has taken on a far more existential tone. For the first time in decades, it threatens to erode the foundations of the welfare state and public well-being as we’ve known them.
Nearly a decade after 2014, at this week’s 2025 NATO Summit in The Hague, the 2% defence spending benchmark already feels like a relic. Under mounting U.S. pressure, leaders pledged an astonishing 5% of GDP on defence by 2035—3.5% earmarked for tanks and fighter jets, and 1.5% for cybersecurity and critical infrastructure. This is not simple: We are witnessing a historic, brazen U-turn. A deepening militarisation of foreign policy that guts the post-WWII social contract that once promised healthcare, education, and dignity for all.
It’s not just about more tanks—it’s about rewiring economies to prioritise arms over welfare. Spain’s delegate called it “unreasonable,” reminding everyone in the room that European nations, already squeezed by inflation and deficits, are facing slashed budgets for schools and hospitals. The United States, meanwhile, laughs all the way to the bank, with its defence giants like Lockheed Martin set to profit handsomely from NATO’s spending spree.
The consequences reach beyond budgets. To achieve this spending goals, national budgets will have to change entirely their paradigm of focus and move away from prioritising social well-being and care policies. Moreover, this militarised pivot endangers global stability and human rights frameworks—including protections for vulnerable communities—undermining the very international order it claims to defend.
NATO: a burden for the US?
“This is a stronger, fairer and more lethal alliance that NATO leaders have begun to build,” Secretary-General Mark Rutte said shortly after the meeting ended. “President Trump made it clear: America is committed to NATO … At the same time, he made clear that America expects European allies and Canada to contribute more. And that is exactly what we see them doing.”
But is it like that? I mean, is it just about security and about making the Europeans step up and pay for their own security?
Former NATO Secretary General George Robertson Just Said the Quiet Part Out Loud.
In a recent interview on The News Agents, George Robertson — NATO Secretary General from 1999 to 2003 and former UK Secretary of State for Defence — said something quite extraordinary.
He explained:
“NATO is a grand bargain for the United States of America. That imbalance allows America to have more clout in NATO than it would have if everybody was absolutely balanced… The $300 billion a year spent by the European or non-US members of NATO amplifies and increases the kind of influence [the U.S. has].”
He continued:
“We need to remind the US that the imbalance inside NATO has been to the advantage of the Americans right up until now — and we also need to remind them that NATO is a bargain for them: 31 automatic allies, meeting every week around the North Atlantic Council table, supporting American foreign policy.”
These are not the words of a fringe critic. This came from a former NATO Chief. I mean — WOW.
So next time you hear someone argue that "Europe shouldn’t rely on the U.S. for its security blah blah", maybe it’s time to turn that argument on its head: It’s actually the U.S. that has been relying on Europe to maintain its global reach.
So how does NATO change peoples’ lives?
It took 21 NATO member states more than a decade to reach the 2% spending target—during a period when public finances were far less strained than they are today. The graph below is revealing (source: NATO):
The 5% pledge sounds even more unrealistic when we consider that countries like Spain, Portugal, Canada, Italy, and Belgium currently spend around 1.55% of their GDP—or even less—on defence!
It is difficult to imagine how they could meet the 5% target without fundamentally shifting their entire economic model towards a sector that is, at its core, entirely counterproductive.
Meeting NATO’s 5% spending target forces national economies into brutal trade-offs that already amplify social inequality and distort economic fundamentals.
— When governments like the UK planned to take away £1.3 billion from elderly care and disability benefits to fund military hikes, they sacrifice social wellbeing for what they call, national security—a false dichotomy. This reallocation isn’t marginal adjustment but systemic dismantling: Sweden now funds its military surge by cutting university subsidies and elder care homes, while Germany delays healthcare reforms to fast-track F-35 purchases. The result? A dangerous slide back to a pre-welfare state era—where citizens are forced to endure crumbling hospitals, understaffed schools, and rising poverty, all to sustain the ambitions of the empire.
— Redirecting capital toward arms manufacturing, a sector with negative societal multiplier effects—threatens the very core of public economics. Unlike green transition or healthcare, military spending exhibits perverse productivity: while inflating GDP metrics, it generates no cumulative welfare. Consider a new world where:
France now diverts 30% of its critical materials (lithium, cobalt) from EV batteries to missiles
Poland’s $30bn artillery contracts crowd out industrial modernisation loans
Italy’s shipyards now prioritise frigates over offshore wind installations
This pivot entrenches a vicious cycle: military-industrial complexes demand perpetual conflict to justify budgets, while starving innovation in productive sectors. We don’t really need the IMF to tell us that such economies evebtually become addicted to securitisation—where growth depends on anticipating destruction rather than investing in stability and social creation.
— The 5% target forces tectonic shifts in an unprecedented way by sacrificing existential priorities for long-term militarisation. Europe’s hundreds of billion of euros annual climate adaptation shortfall now competes directly with missile defence funding. out of a sudden, we are hearing voices talking about Israel being the ideal model. EU conflict prevention funds fell almost by half since the previous EU Parliament term while at the same time armies grew. This isn’t just misallocation, but active backsliding: militarisation redirects engineers from grid resilience to drone swarms, diplomats from mediation to arms dealing, and lawmakers from climate accords to NATO compliance reports. The paradigm shift transforms economies from societal future-proofing to perpetual war preparation—a surrender to escalation logic that guarantees long-term vulnerability.
But let’s not overanalyse things - Trump himself said when leaving the summit that NATO defence spend rising to 5% of GDP is “big win” for US and the West. In a world gripped by uncertainty, the shift toward militarisation risks undermining the very social fabric that held post-war societies together. As governments pledge billions to defence while hospitals collapse and classrooms empty, I think we must ask: whose security are we really protecting? This is not just a matter of budgets—it’s a political choice, and one that will define the future of democracy, rights, and collective wellbeing in Europe and beyond.
Stelios Foteinopoulos is a policy analyst specialising in European and public policy and strategy and a former EU advisor.