Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has pledged another $500 million in military aid to Ukraine. Trudeau made this promise while speaking separately with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the NATO summit in Washington, DC.
Trudeau made this announcement after heavy pressure from US politicians. US politicians have publicly criticized Canada for not keeping its defense spending commitments. A senior government official said Canada should give a time frame for when it can meet the funding target and provide more information on what it plans to do.
NATO members have agreed to spend at least 2 percent of their gross domestic product on defense. Canada’s current defense spending is 1.37 percent of its GDP.
Trudeau tried to deflect this criticism in his speech. He said that since coming to power, he has been working to keep the promise of increasing defense spending.
Canada’s defense budget has grown by more than 57 percent since 2014. This year their defense budget is 2,990 billion dollars. NATO member countries spending the most in terms of defense dollars include the US, UK, France, Germany, Italy, Poland and Turkey. However, 23 of the 32 members are expected to achieve the 2 percent target this year. And Canada is the only country that has not presented a plan to reach the 2 percent target.
Fenn Hampson, a professor of international relations at Carleton University in Ottawa, said the plan should have been exchanged earlier, so that our partners understood that the issue was important to us. Clearly, American politicians have their eyes peeled and the narrative continues that we are the weakest northern link in NATO.
In a letter to Trudeau in May 2023, US senators urged him to come to the conference with a clean plan.
