Eduardo González
The People’s Party parliamentary group in Congress has asked the Government which “individual and collective bodies within the Armed Forces and the Ministry of Defense” participated in calculating the 2.1% figure that Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez referred to as “sufficient to meet the capability commitments required by NATO.”
In a written question submitted on October 14 and published this week in the Official Gazette of the Spanish Parliament (BOCG), the People’s Party points out that on June 22, Pedro Sánchez announced, in an institutional statement from the Moncloa Palace ahead of the then-imminent NATO summit in The Hague, that “the Government had just reached an agreement with the Alliance that would allow Spain to meet its NATO commitments without having to increase defense spending to five percent of GDP,” an agreement that, according to the PP, was subsequently rejected by NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte.
Furthermore, and “despite the fact that the institutional declaration by the heads of state and government of the Alliance stated that an agreement had been reached to increase the defense spending threshold to five percent of GDP,” Sánchez declared at the press conference following the Summit on June 25 that the allies had “agreed on technical and human capabilities to address the challenges that member states need in the coming years, both from a security and a defense perspective.”
At that same press conference, the People’s Party recalls, Sánchez affirmed that “Spain will fulfill the agreed capabilities and will continue to be a key player in the European security architecture, both on the southern flank, to which we geographically belong, and also on the eastern flank.”
Furthermore, the People’s Group continues, Sánchez asserted at that same press conference that it was not he who had decided that Spain did not need to reach five percent to achieve these objectives, but rather that “it is the Armed Forces, it is the Ministry of Defense, that says that these capabilities, which have been agreed upon by us and the other member states within the Atlantic Alliance, can be achieved with 2.1% of our Gross Domestic Product.”
In this regard, the People’s Group recalls that the Industrial and Technological Plan for Security and Defense stipulated the creation of a “National Committee for Security and Technological Sovereignty” attached to the Prime Minister’s Office. “This body was created by the Council of Ministers on June 24th: therefore, the same day the Summit began,” meaning that the Committee had not yet “been able to participate in anything related to the fulfillment of the 2.1 percent announced by the Prime Minister,” it adds.
Therefore, the People’s Group asks the Government “which individual and collective bodies of the Armed Forces and the Ministry of Defense participated in calculating the 2.1 percent figure that the Prime Minister referred to as sufficient to meet the capability commitments required by NATO.”
It also requests clarification on “which reports, documents, or files issued by the Armed Forces, the Ministry of Defense, or any other individual or collective body of the Government or the General State Administration (including the date of issuance and the names of the signing authorities) support the Prime Minister’s assertion that NATO’s requirements can be met with 2.1 percent of our Gross Domestic Product” and, finally, “what calculation was used to support such assertions.”