Pete Hegseth, the United States Secretary of Defense, called on Washington’s European allies this Saturday to stop “moralizing.” He also warned of “important decisions” to come regarding security in Europe.
American Defense Minister Pete Hegseth once again attacked Washington’s European allies this Saturday, May 30, accusing them of having ignored calls to strengthen their defense “for too long” and calling on them to refrain from “moralizing.”
The leader warned of “important decisions” to come regarding security in Europe, in a speech at a major defense conference in Singapore, the Shangri-La Dialogue.
He praised the Asian countries which, according to him, “have long understood that the basis of a lasting partnership is not based on idealistic values, but on a concrete alignment of national interests.”
“Western Europe could learn from this”
“When our interests converge, we act together with determination. When our interests diverge, we adapt with pragmatism, without drama and without preaching. I think Western Europe could learn from this,” he declared.
Echoing the very critical position of the Trump administration towards the Europeans, Pete Hegseth criticized the latter for having long held “empty globalist rhetoric about an international order based on rules while European capitals opened their borders wide and emptied their armies of their substance”.
Donald Trump has long demanded that Europeans take greater responsibility for their own security. He wants to reduce the American military presence on the Old Continent, a subject that has come back to the table in recent weeks in the face of their refusal to support his war against Iran.
Investing collectively for defense
“Europe and NATO have important decisions to make and you will know more soon,” Pete Hegseth said on Saturday.
“For too long, polite appeals to our European allies to spend more on their own defense have gone unheeded,” he lamented. “They are finally catching up.”
Under pressure from Donald Trump, NATO set itself the objective last year of collectively investing 5% of its members’ GDP in defense, but most of the countries concerned are still very far from it.
Asked to react to Pete Hegseth’s comments, the French Minister of the Armed Forces, Catherine Vautrin, present at the Shangri-La Dialogue, recalled that she will bring to the Senate on Tuesday the text updating the military programming law (LPM).
“In 10 years, (…) we will have doubled the Defense budget. This shows that we are committed to this rearmament approach,” she declared to AFP.
“We are allies”
Asked whether, with these comments from Pete Hegseth and the American war against Iran, the United States was still a reliable ally of France, she indicated that there was “250 years of history” between the two countries.
“Between France and the United States, we are allies, we are not always aligned (…) that does not prevent us from discussing, it does not prevent us from working,” she stressed.
During a recent NATO meeting in Sweden, the head of American diplomacy, Marco Rubio, confirmed to Europeans that they would have to learn to live with fewer American soldiers.
He indicated that an adjustment would soon be announced concerning what some in the Atlantic Alliance call “the cavalry”, the pool of forces that can be mobilized within 180 days if necessary.
