Call in Parliament for billions of euros for defense | Inland

Because of the war in Ukraine, the Netherlands must increase defense spending as quickly as possible, says VVD MP Ruben Brekelmans. “The Netherlands still does not meet NATO’s 2 percent standard,” he says during the Ukraine debate in the House. “That is really no longer possible. Money should no longer be the problem.”

Coalition party D66 is also prepared to allocate considerably more money to Defence, following Germany’s lead. According to D66 member Sjoerd Sjoerdsma, the Netherlands has made a ‘major course change’ by spending billions of euros more on defense in the coalition agreement. “But if more is needed, then it has to be,” he says.

Deferred maintenance

In the coalition agreement, more than 3 billion euros has been set aside for Defence. That budget is largely needed to carry out overdue maintenance. There are major shortages of ammunition and equipment. Defense also has a huge staff shortage: there are thousands of vacancies. With the increased budget, the government expects to spend about 1.85 percent of GDP on defense in 2024: that is less than the NATO standard of 2 percent.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced this weekend that he wants to put 100 billion euros into the German army. With this he wants to amply meet the 2 percent standard. This is seen as a major turnaround. According to GL leader Jesse Klaver, Europe already spends a lot of money on defense. He wants European armies to cooperate more.

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