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German politicians rebuke Trump over NATO defence spending demand

Published

1 year ago

January 8, 2025

German politicians rebuke Trump over NATO defence spending demand

US President-elect Donald Trump said NATO member states should increase their defence spending to 5% of GDP and criticised Europe’s contributions.

Several politicians in Germany have pushed back against US President-elect Donald Trump’s suggestion that NATO’s European members should spend 5% of their gross domestic product (GDP) on defence, more than double the current target.

On Tuesday evening, Trump said that NATO nations were spending too little on defence and complained that “Europe is in for a tiny fraction of the money that we’re in”.

“They can all afford it, but they should be at 5% not 2%,” Trump told reporters at a press conference in Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida.

None of the alliance’s 32 members are currently spending 5% of GDP on defence, according to NATO data. Poland is the biggest spender by share of GDP at 4.12%, followed by Estonia at 3.43% and the US at 3.38%.

Ralf Stegner, a member of Germany’s Social Democrat Party (SPD) party, called Trump’s comments “delusional and absolutely insane” in a post on Facebook.

“We don’t need more weapons in the world, but fewer,” Stegner told Politico.

Marcus Faber, chairman of the defence committee in Germany’s parliament, agreed that 5% was too high. Faber said that NATO countries would have to agree on a new goal beyond 2%, but stated that the target should be 3% and decided by consensus.

Free Democratic Party (FDP) politician Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmerman said: “We are not at a bazaar here.”

“Trump, who sees himself as a dealmaker, naturally also hopes that the increased financial commitment of the European partners will benefit US industry in particular. But please don’t make up a number out of thin air,” Strack-Zimmerman said.

Trump’s latest call for NATO members to increase their defence spending is nothing new. During his first presidency, he repeatedly threatened to pull out of the military alliance if European allies failed to boost their spending.

The EU’s NATO members have increased their defence spending in recent years, largely as a result of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

NATO estimated that 23 (including 16 from the EU) of its 32 members would meet its goal of spending 2% of GDP in 2024, up from just six countries in 2021. Italy, Belgium, and Spain are among those who are yet to reach the 2% threshold.

Germany will hit the 2% target for the first time this year, after German Chancellor Olaf Scholz promised a complete overhaul of the country’s military in 2022, breaking years of taboo against the country investing heavily in its military.

Despite this, officials and reports have repeatedly suggested that Germany’s military is unfit for purpose. An annual report released by parliament in March 2024 found that the Bundeswehr was “aged and shrinking” and severely lacked equipment and personnel.

The general consensus in Germany’s political establishment is that the nation should either maintain or increase its military spending — with several parties promoting a spending boost as part of their campaigns for the upcoming election set for 23 February.

Green party chancellor candidate Robert Habeck told Spiegel magazine that Germany should aim for 3.5% in upcoming years.

“Geopolitically, it is foreseeable that we – Germany and Europe – will have to take more responsibility for our security, anything else would be naïve in view of the positioning of the USA,” Habeck said.

Friedrich Merz, leader of Germany’s opposition Christian Democrat Union (CDU) and the man tipped to succeed Scholz as chancellor, on Wednesday said the country would spend more on defence but he would not be drawn on a specific spending target.

“The 2, 3 or 5% (targets) are basically irrelevant, the decisive factor is that we do what is necessary to defend ourselves,” Merz told broadcaster Bayerischer Rundfunk.

NATO’s new chief, Mark Rutte, has warned that the 2% target is insufficient, and said in December that citizens of NATO member states should accept “sacrifices” including cuts to their pensions, health and security systems in order to boost military spending in Europe.

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World

Video: What Tunnel Entrances Reveal About a Key Iranian Nuclear Site

Published

7 hours ago

March 20, 2026

Press Room

Video: What Tunnel Entrances Reveal About a Key Iranian Nuclear Site

new video loaded: What Tunnel Entrances Reveal About a Key Iranian Nuclear Site

transcript

What Tunnel Entrances Reveal About a Key Iranian Nuclear Site

Satellite images show how Iran has tried to bolster its defenses at parts of the Isfahan nuclear facility.

: What you’re seeing here are buried tunnel entrances at a nuclear facility in Iran. It’s one of the most important sites in the country for U.S. and Israeli forces. U.N. inspectors think that roughly half of Iran’s highly enriched uranium is buried here. And these three entrances are the only known ways to access it. If you think about nuclear sites in Iran, three main sites come to mind. They’re pretty well known: Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan. Natanz and Fordo, They were largely taken out in U.S. strikes last year. So I’ve been focusing on Isfahan. The uranium here is still relatively accessible. It’s actually a pretty large complex. This area here was very important for uranium processing, but it was heavily hit by the U.S. and Israel last June. If you go a little bit further north, that is underground and that requires tunnels to enter. In a terrain view, it gets quite interesting. There are three roads that lead to these tunnel entrances, and these tunnel entrances have become very important, both last year, but also right now. They lead to the underground facility where U.N. inspectors say uranium is stored and a new enrichment site could be located. If this falls into the wrong hands, that would be a problem in the long term. Here’s a great example of how very recent satellite imagery gives us new insights. This is from late January of this year, and what you see here is a line of trucks. And they’re filled with soil, and they’re lining up to go to some of these tunnel entrances. If you look a little bit closer here, you see another one of these trucks that’s just unloading some of the soil and some earthmoving equipment. Iran in preparation for any possible attacks at that point. They try to protect this facility a little bit more. So this is Jan. 29. And if you just look a few days later, we go to Feb. 2. This is the completely buried tunnel entrance, completely covered in soil to protect from any attack. And this is how it still looks in mid-March. The U.S. and Israel have basically two options here: The first one is to heavily bombard the entrances to this underground complex that would block any access, at least in the near future. They haven’t done that yet. So that’s very, very interesting — a little bit surprising. And it might point towards a second option: That would be to go in with ground forces and to extract the uranium. But that would require a really large amount of troops to secure the vast area, bringing in earthmoving equipment to clear the tunnels and a lot of time in hostile territory.
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Satellite images show how Iran has tried to bolster its defenses at parts of the Isfahan nuclear facility.

By Christoph Koettl and Alexander Cardia

March 20, 2026

World

Iranian man, 2nd person arrested after allegedly trying to enter UK nuclear missile base: report

Published

8 hours ago

March 20, 2026

Press Room

Iranian man, 2nd person arrested after allegedly trying to enter UK nuclear missile base: report

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!

Two people were arrested after allegedly unsuccessfully attempting to enter HM Naval Base Clyde in Scotland on Thursday, authorities confirmed to Fox News Digital.

One suspect was an Iranian man, while the other was a woman of unknown nationality, The Telegraph reported.

“Around 5pm on Thursday, 19 March, 2026, we were made aware of two people attempting to enter HM Naval Base Clyde,” Police Scotland said in a statement to Fox News Digital. “A 34-year-old man and 31-year-old woman have been arrested in connection and enquiries are ongoing.”

The Telegraph reported that the man was Iranian, while the woman’s nationality was not immediately known. Citing the Times, the Telegraph said the suspects were turned away from the base because they lacked the correct passes and were later arrested nearby for allegedly “acting suspiciously in the vicinity.”

IRAN’S NEW SUPREME LEADER LINKED TO PROPERTIES WITH ‘LINE OF SIGHT’ INTO ISRAELI UK EMBASSY

HMS Artful, an Astute-class nuclear-powered fleet submarine, is shown at His Majesty’s Naval Base Clyde on March 4, 2025, in Faslane, Scotland. (Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

A Royal Navy spokesperson said in a statement to Fox News Digital, “Police Scotland have arrested two people who unsuccessfully attempted to enter HM Naval Base Clyde on Thursday 19 March. As the matter is subject to an ongoing investigation, we will not comment further.”

HM Naval Base Clyde — commonly known as Faslane — is considered the primary base for the United Kingdom’s missile fleet.

PENCE BACKS TRUMP’S IRAN STRIKES, SAYS PRESIDENT ‘IGNORED’ GOP ISOLATIONISTS

A general view of His Majesty’s Naval Base Clyde on March 4, 2025, in Faslane, Scotland. (Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

The Royal Navy says the base is home “to the core of the Submarine Service, including the nation’s nuclear deterrent, and the new generation of hunter-killer submarines.”

The U.K. Parliament says the Royal Navy currently operates a fleet of nine submarines, with the entire fleet based at HM Naval Base Clyde.

His Majesty’s Naval Base (HMNB) Clyde, also known as Faslane, hosts the U.K.’s nuclear submarines, which are armed with Trident missiles and serve as the U.K.’s nuclear deterrent. (Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

“Five of those are conventionally-armed nuclear-powered attack submarines of the Astute class. A further four are ballistic missiles submarines (SSBN) of the Vanguard class that comprise the UK’s submarine-based nuclear deterrent,” it added.

Greg Norman is a reporter at Fox News Digital.

World

Iran’s Khamenei says enemy ‘defeated’ in written Nowruz message

Published

9 hours ago

March 20, 2026

Press Room

Iran’s Khamenei says enemy ‘defeated’ in written Nowruz message

Mojtaba Khamenei has not been seen in public since he replaced his slain father as Iran’s supreme leader.

Published On 20 Mar 2026

Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei has said Iran’s enemies were being “defeated” in a written message for the Persian New Year, as the US and Israel continue to pound the country with attacks.

In a statement read on Iranian television on Friday, Khamenei praised the steadfastness of the Iranian people marking Nowruz, which he said ushered in ‌the year of a “resistance economy under national unity and national security”.

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“At the moment, due to the particular unity that has been created between you, our compatriots – despite all the differences in religious, intellectual, cultural and political origins – the enemy has been defeated,” he said.

Khamenei has not been seen in public since he became supreme leader, following the assassination of his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, at the start of the war on February 28.

Iran’s supreme leader said that while the US and Israel believed that after one or two days of attacks, the Iranian people would overthrow the government, but this was a “gross miscalculation”.

The war was launched under “the delusion that if the pinnacle of the regime and certain influential military figures were to attain martyrdom, it would instil fear and despair in our dear people … and through this means, the dream of dominating Iran and subsequently dismembering it would be realised”, he said.

Instead, “a fracture has emerged in the enemy,” he added.

Analysts have observed that the Iranian constitution itself was drafted with the spectre of a power vacuum in mind, a “survival protocol” designed to give the system the capacity to continue even at a moment of maximum shock.

Khamenei also denied that Iran or its ‌allied forces were responsible for attacks ⁠against Turkiye and ⁠Oman.

Those were “false flag” incidents used by Iran’s enemy to “sow discord among neighbours, and it may occur in other countries as well”, he claimed.

The Turkish Ministry of National Defence last week said NATO air defences intercepted a ballistic missile launched from Iran. Two people were killed in Oman after drones came down in the Sohar province.

The supreme leader also called on Afghanistan and Pakistan to end their fighting and said he stood ready to assist.

“We consider our eastern neighbours to be very close to us”, the supreme leader said. “I appeal to our two brotherly countries, Afghanistan and Pakistan, to establish better relations with each other … and I myself am ready to take the necessary actions.”

The neighbouring countries agreed to a temporary “pause” in hostilities during the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr this week, after weeks of deadly violence.