Germany will move to new security requests in Europe, said President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, as his country has marked 70 years of NATO membership in the context of the Trump administration reporting that US priorities are elsewhere.
“Today, with the Putin war against Ukraine which rages in force and with the United States exercising fierce pressure on its European allies, Germany, I think, is in a crucial position,” said Steinmeier.
“Germany is called and we heard the call. We have received the message and indeed, Mark, you can count on us,” he said, alongside the secretary general of NATO, Mark Rutte, at the headquarters of the military alliance of 32 countries in Brussels.
In the same place in February, the Secretary in the United States of Defense, Pete Hegseth, told Ukraine Western donors – most of NATO members – “that the striking strategic realities prevent the United States of America from being mainly focused on the security of Europe”.
In addition to the security challenges that the United States believes to be posed by China, HegSeth said that America “also focused on the security of our own borders.”
His remarks – The first by a member of the new NATO Trump administration – Instructions of Germany and other allies and many want to know how many American troops could be withdrawn from Europe and when they can fill any vacuum of security.
No US military withdrawal plan has been officially announced.
Hegseth has also added a warning that Ukraine will not recover its entire Russia territory and will not be allowed to join their security alliance, which would provide kyiv with the ultimate security guarantee to ensure that Putin never attacks.
NATO leaders have always insisted that membership should be discussed only among the allies and candidates and that Moscow cannot have his say, but recently, it has become a negotiation program in talks between the United States, Russia and Ukraine.
NATO was formed in 1949 as a bulwark against the aggression in Europe by the Soviet Union of the time.
The former Western Germany sought protection as a 15th member on May 6, 1955, when the concern grew up over the Soviet army massaged in the east of the iron curtain.
Seventy years later, the threat of Moscow persisted and the incoming coalition of Germany has ambitious plans to loosen strict debt rules for higher defense expenses in order to strengthen the country's long-term army.
The outgoing government has created a special fund of 100 billion euros to modernize it, helping Berlin also achieved NATO's objective to spend 2% of GDP, which should be set at 3% or more when organizational leaders meet in the Netherlands in June.
“We will endeavor to make Germany, both its soldiers and its infrastructure, the backbone of conventional defense in Europe,” said Steinmeier.
Speaking inside the Caverneux atrium which leads to meeting rooms and NATO national offices, he praised the allies' decision to admit Western Germany as a member and said that he hoped that NATO leaders will be able to show “strategic wisdom today, because the way here seems even more uncertain than he looked at”. “”
ADVERTISEMENTThe challenge, said Steinmeier, is to maintain values such as democracy and the rule of law as much as defending the territory.
“We all know that they were attacked, not only from the outside but also from the inside,” he said.
