NATO’s 5% Defence Spending Goal

Feasibility, Sustainability and Effects

Keywords: NATO, defence, spending, badget, defence indrusty, Europe, strategy

Abstract

increasing their defence and security-related expenditures to 5 percent of their gross national product by 2035. This political commitment, if implemented, could provide hundreds of billions of euros worth of resources annually for the development of defence capabilities, forces, defence industries, security institutions, and the infrastructure that supports them. At the same time, such an increase in defence spending, unseen since the Cold War, raises fundamental economic, and through it political and societal questions, and its technological impacts could also be decisive in the next decade. The analysis examines these development dilemmas and trajectories with the aim of indicating the limits and risks of feasibility and sustainability.

Author Biography

Tamás Csiki Varga, Ludovika University of Public Service, Eötvös József Research Centre Lukacs Institute for Strategy and Politics

senior research fellow

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Published
2026-08-29