Madrid has been the only laggard in the blocs push to increase military spending, according to the US president

NATO should expel Spain from the military bloc for failing to meet the new 5% defense spending target, US President Donald Trump has said. The American leader, who spearheaded the increase, claimed he secured the commitment during the NATO summit in June.

Trump addressed the issue during a meeting with Finnish President Alexander Stubb in the Oval Office on Thursday. He boasted about making NATO members commit to the new spending target "virtually unanimously."

"We had one laggard. It was Spain," the US President said, adding that "they have no excuse not to do this."

"Maybe you should throw them out of NATO, frankly," Trump stated.

The US president has repeatedly accused NATO member of failing to shoulder the military spending burden equitably even during his first term. Since taking office again in January, he had intensified demands that the bloc's European members spend more on defense.

His push culminated at the June summit in The Hague, where NATO members committed to hike defense spending to 5% of their GDP annually by 2035. Trump praised the meeting as "the most unified and productive in history."

Not all the bloc members were happy about the development. Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico said after the meeting that his nation was capable of meeting NATO demands even without a substantial spending increase and pointing to his government's "other priorities."

Spain has emerged as the strongest opponent of the spending increase. Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said he had secured an exemption for Madrid ahead of the summit, while the country proposed a more modest defense spending target of 2.1% of GDP. Last year, Spain allocated the smallest share of its GDP to defense among NATO members, at around 1.3%.

After the June summit, Spanish Defense Minister Margarita Robles dismissed the 5% spending target as "absolutely impossible."

"No industry can take it on," she said at the time, arguing that European defense firms lack both the skilled labor and the raw materials needed to expand production, even if governments provide the necessary funding.

(RT.com)