NATO will boost defense spending to help back Ukraine but the math is tricky. Just ask Luxembourg

By LORNE COOK
Associated Press

BRUSSELS (AP) — NATO leaders are set to make a new defense spending pledge at their summit this week as support for Ukraine eats into their military budgets. Only 11 countries are set to meet NATO’s current spending ambition of 2% of national gross domestic product this year. But U.S. President Joe Biden and his counterparts are set to make 2% the least that nations should do. That is a spending floor rather than a budgetary ceiling. Tiny Luxembourg is an easy target when it comes to criticizing the low defense spenders at NATO. Germany also gets its share of criticism. But the 2% metric is a slippery one and hides national particularities that can’t easily be disguised with creative accounting.