The Diplomat
The Governments of Spain and the United States signed yesterday the agreement for the renewal of the US-Spanish Defense Agreement and, therefore, for the stationing of two additional US destroyers at the Rota Naval Base (Cadiz), just four days before the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, will be received by the President of the United States, Joe Biden, at the White House.
The agreement was signed by the Minister of Defense, Margarita Robles, and the U.S. Ambassador to Spain, Julissa Reynoso, on behalf of the respective governments, as reported by the two departments in press releases.
The expansion of U.S. military capabilities in Rota is included in the Joint Declaration adopted by Sánchez and Biden at the La Moncloa complex (their first major bilateral meeting) on the eve of the NATO Summit held in June 2022 in Madrid. Specifically, the agreement provides for the dispatch of two more destroyers to Rota, which will join the four destroyers that the US has had at this base since 2014 and 2015 (USS Carney, USS Donald Cook, USS Porter and USS Ross), which are integrated into NATO’s missile shield and are the only US destroyers with a permanent home port in Europe.
The deployment of the two additional ships is expected to take place in the next few years, one in 2024 and the next one in the following years, according to the Ministry of Defense. Margarita Robles will register today a request to appear before the Defense Committee of the Congress to report on this agreement.
“Spain and the United States thus reiterate their commitment to the Atlantic Alliance in this new context of the war in Ukraine and the security environment in Europe, while sharing their concern for the situation in the Mediterranean and Africa and also conveying a message of responsibility and reassurance in our Southern direction, to which this agreement confers a singular strategic importance,” the Ministry stated.
The expansion, according to the Ministry of Defense, will be carried out “without modifying neither the missions nor the types of forces or maximum force levels, both of civilian personnel and U.S. military personnel currently authorized for said Base in the Defense Cooperation Agreement, which remains in full force and effect”.
For her part, Julissa Reynoso declared that this agreement “is more than a security document, it is the reflection of a relationship based on shared beliefs: that democracy is the best system of government, that anyone anywhere in the world can enjoy the guarantees and promises of human rights, and that international order based on law is the best guarantee of peace and security”.
“We thank the people of Spain for the extraordinary hospitality they have shown for nearly 70 years in welcoming U.S. military personnel and their families here,” she continued, quoted in the Embassy’s press release. “This hospitality supports more than 5,000 Spanish jobs and causes U.S. forces to inject more than 280 million euros a year into the local economy,” she continued. “With this agreement to host two additional U.S. destroyers in Rota, we look forward to the arrival of new military personnel and their families with the consequent increase in economic activity and job creation in southern Spain,” she concluded.
Political storm and renewal of the agreement
The agreement with the United States generated a new political storm within the coalition Government, after the PP declared its support for the measure and Unidas Podemos (minority partner of the Government) announced its intention to vote against it in Congress. In fact, that was what happened in July last year during the vote on a PP motion for a resolution agreed with the PSOE to promote the increase of the Defense budget and which urged the Government to “support the expansion of the military contingent requested for the Rota base”. The text (non-binding, but with “symbolic” importance) was approved with 222 votes in favor, 68 against (including the seats of Unidas Podemos) and 55 abstentions.
The 1988 U.S.-Spanish Defense Agreement expired in May 2021 and the reform of the text would require the support of the Lower House. However, the treaty itself establishes extensions for periods of one year through “administrative development agreements”. Therefore, the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Defense consider that to amend the text (and, therefore, to allow the arrival of the two ships) only an administrative agreement is necessary, which will not necessarily have to pass through Congress, except for information purposes, as it happened with three other previous amendments and as it will happen in this case. Precisely, the 2012 amendment, which preceded the arrival of the four previous destroyers, allows the two parties to “enter into administrative agreements for the development” of the agreement.
To that end, the Council of Ministers authorized last January “the negotiation of an agreement in development of the Second Protocol of Amendment to the Defense Cooperation Agreement between the Kingdom of Spain and the United States of America of December 1, 1988, for the stationing of two additional U.S. destroyers at the Rota naval base.” This expansion of the U.S. military presence in Spain, he continued, will contribute to “strengthening NATO’s ballistic missile defense system” in the face of “the new security challenges posed in our environment, which require maximum coordination to continue to maintain the security of Spain and the United States and the mutual contribution of both countries to the Atlantic Alliance and international security”.
