BRUSSELS — NATO is beginning talks this month on the forces and weapons allies would need to defend against a Russian attack — and how they would pay for them.
The talks will set capability targets for 2029, requiring each of NATO’s 32 member countries to provide specific forces and equipment.
The deadline raises the stakes: European officials have warned that Russia could be ready to attack a NATO country by then.
At the same time, the Trump administration is weighing a sharp reduction in U.S. forces in Europe, which could leave the alliance short of troops and critical capabilities with fewer like refueling aircraft, long-range missiles and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assets.
The negotiations will test how much each country is willing to spend, how much Europe can do without the U.S. and whether NATO’s military plans should make greater use of technologies such as robotics and artificial intelligence.
“It’s going to be tough,” said one senior NATO diplomat, who, like others, was granted anonymity to speak freely on the sensitive issue. “Burden sharing, the U.S., how to combine the level of ambition with political priorities … it’s huge.”
NATO allies will begin discussing the broad mandate for the new targets — known as Political Guidance — in the coming days. It’s the first step in a five-part effort called the NATO Defence Planning Process.
“The ambition … is for this to be a transformation cycle and not one that’s just off the shelf,” said French Adm. Pierre Vandier, NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander Transformation and the alliance’s chief for future warfare.
POLITICO spoke to 15 current and former NATO officials and diplomats to get a sense of the five key debates likely to define the negotiations.
1. Deciding on ambition
The most significant issue will be deciding exactly how many troops and military capabilities allies want to provide — known as the level of ambition.
Historically, NATO allies have agreed that beyond the forces needed for major operations, they should have 18 spare brigades — each a unit of about 5,000 soldiers — to carry out smaller crisis-management missions outside alliance territory, like Afghanistan or Kosovo.
But U.S. pressure to hand off more security responsibility to European allies — dubbed NATO 3.0 — could put pressure on allies to reduce or even eliminate requirements for any smaller operations.
Discussions will also cover whether to speed up the process itself in future in response to the furious pace of battlefield innovation, from AI to ground robots.
Allies are also likely to tackle how to provide conventional military support — like ground troops or aircraft — to nuclear-armed countries like the U.K. and U.S.
“Conventional support … capabilities are absolutely part of the NDPP process,” said Nassima Barrows, NATO’s nuclear policy director, “so that is one of the big messages that we underline as a part of the next [negotiations].”
2. Filling the American gap
Looming over the talks is the Pentagon’s upcoming review of American forces in Europe. Washington earlier this year already pulled assets like strategic bombers, fighter jets, drones, submarines and warships from the pool of forces NATO can draw on.
The review lands in December, midway through the NATO talks, prompting concerns it may delay negotiations. There are worries that the U.S. could pull out assets Europe needs, like heavy transport aircraft.
Washington’s drive to curb its military presence in Europe will set off a scramble among allies to replace its capabilities. That will open discussions on how to share the burden fairly, likely to be very difficult as national budgets are increasingly squeezed.
“Not so long ago, the whole NATO process was … you do the math on what NATO needs, and then when you realize you don’t have everything, the U.S. fills in the gaps,” said Camille Grand, head of the ASD defense lobby and a former senior NATO official. “This is no longer the case.”
One way to tackle that is to shift away from specific weapons requirements to assigning objectives to countries, such as having their forces eliminate Russian command outposts. That could create more flexibility for European allies to who can’t access U.S. weapons like Tomahawk cruise missiles.
“We don’t have to have thousands of Tomahawks … but we can have thousands cheaper, low-cost alternatives,” said Fabrice Pothier, a former NATO policy planning director who is now CEO of the Rasmussen Global consultancy.
3. Regional divides
The focus on Russia is likely to cause friction with allies worried about other threats.
On paper, NATO espouses a “360-degree” approach to security. In practice, the alliance’s focus has shifted eastward since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and northward in the past year as it set up an Arctic mission (largely in response to pressure from Donald Trump over Greenland).
Some allies would like to see more attention given to the alliance’s southern and southeastern flanks. Issues include Russian mercenary presence in Libya, the potential for weaponized migration and increased submarine activity, alongside drone attacks on vessels in the Black Sea.
“There is too much north,” said a second NATO diplomat. “We should reset.”
4. More drones or more tanks
The drone warfare dominating the frontlines in Ukraine is likely to force a debate on the balance between adding unmanned capabilities and continuing to build up conventional military equipment like tanks and artillery.
Most allies are making plans to increase their use of unmanned systems.
The U.K. this year announced a “hybrid fleet” that leans on autonomous vessels like Type 93 uncrewed underwater vehicles. France has earmarked roughly €8.4 billion for drones and loitering munitions while Germany is establishing its first dedicated drone regiment next year.
Europe’s difficulties in recruiting soldiers also feed into the debate, said Grand. “One thing that is driving everybody in the direction of more unmanned [systems] is we have aging societies — we have a manpower issue.”
Countries also have to figure out how to match Russia’s technological developments without breaking national defense budgets.
Vandier said Russia produces 9 million drones a year, a figure that requires a “pretty radical effort” from the alliance. He suggested one fix could be a subscription-style model for hardware updates to keep weapons systems from becoming obsolete.
5. Learning from Ukraine
Most NATO allies agree that Ukraine contributes to their security thanks to its large and battle-hardened military and its rapid technological developments in air, sea and ground drones, air defenses, missiles, and its advanced Delta battlefield management system.
That has some countries calling for closer military and industrial cooperation, even as others urge caution because the war in Ukraine is different from NATO’s doctrine, which calls for rapid-maneuver warfare, air superiority and standoff precision strikes.
“There are tremendous lessons from the conflict that we need to capture,” NATO’s top commander, U.S. Gen. Alexus Grynkewich, told the European Parliament earlier this month. But “we do not want to fight that kind of war.”
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