Here’s a tweet from the US President, en route to Europe for the NATO summit.
Many countries in NATO, which we are expected to defend, are not only short of their current commitment of 2% (which is low), but are also delinquent for many years in payments that have not been made. Will they reimburse the U.S.?
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 10, 2018
This is a straight up lie. None NATO member states are behind on any payments to NATO. The entire NATO unified budget is under $2 billion. The US pays 21% of that total. I explain some of these details here.
These claims are no better than pure propaganda on behalf of President Trump’s master in Moscow. The NATO member state owes the US any money. NATO member states have committed to spending more on their own military budgets by 2024. That’s six years from now. Most have already increased their spending on their own military budgets since the non-binding agreement was made at a NATO summit in 2014.
This is really no different from President Trump’s claims about the Deep State, and Bob Mueller as a feral Democratic operative and all the rest. Straight up lies which go largely uncontested.
