(Bloomberg) -- NATO chief Mark Rutte urged member states to produce more weapons and ammunition as he affirmed the alliance is on track to meet a €40 billion ($44 billion) spending target this year for Ukraine.
The new secretary general of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization urged a new focus on scaling up defense production, including equipment for land, air and sea as well as shells. At the same time, NATO is set to meet a spending pledge after committing €20.9 billion in the first half, he said.
“We need to move further and faster to meet the growing threats we face,” Rutte told reporters in Brussels on Wednesday ahead of the first meeting of NATO defense ministers during his tenure.
Western governments are struggling to maintain public backing for Kyiv’s fight against Russia, which has dragged on for more then two-and-a-half years. The wariness has prompted pressure on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to begin to factor in an endgame to the conflict.
Zelenskiy presented his “victory plan” to lawmakers in Kyiv earlier Wednesday, outlining his terms for a potential end to Russia’s invasion. He reinforced his refusal to accept concessions on territorial gains or enter a process that would result in a frozen conflict.
The first point of the plan is an unconditional invitation for Ukraine to join NATO. Zelenskiy plans to arrive in Brussels during a European Union summit meeting Thursday, where he’ll brief EU leaders.
Rutter told reporters on Thursday that Zelenskiy can count on NATO’s continued support to put his country in a strong position ahead of potential talks with Russia to end the war. He also reiterated that Kyiv will eventually join the alliance.
“Ukraine will be a member of NATO in the future, that is what we decided in Washington,” he said. “The question is the timeline.”
Two Lanes
Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur said the issue of offering Ukraine an explicit invitation still divided the alliance.
“There are countries who are ready to move faster; there are countries who want to discuss more,” Pevkur said in an interview.
NATO defense chiefs were to follow up on a deal at the alliance’s July summit in Washington, where they agreed on €40 billion in aid for this year. That pledge fell short of attempts by Rutte’s predecessor, Jens Stoltenberg, to secure a firm multi-year funding framework entailing guaranteed funding for the foreseeable future.
Since taking the reins at the beginning of the month, the former Dutch premier has focused on the alliance’s need to ramp up investments in the defense industry.
“We have made significant advances over the past two years on the production of munitions and the manufacturing of new ships, combat vehicles and jets,” Rutte said. “But we are still not producing enough — and the costs remain too high.”
As more members meet a NATO commitment to spend 2% of economic output on defense since Russia’s war started — a goal that eluded most in the last decade — Rutte has also set out a call to spend more in a bid to be prepared for a future conflict.
While in Brussels, defense ministers will discuss a new command center in Wiesbaden, Germany to coordinate assistance and training for Ukraine. The alliance will also focus on working with industry to improve standardization as a way to knit together NATO armies and improve procurement practices, according to an official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
A coordinated push has helped NATO to be on track to produce 2 million rounds of 155 millimeter artillery shells this year, the official said. Kyiv’s chronic shortage of ammunition has fed into Russia’s grinding advances in eastern Ukraine this year.
Rutte said Wednesday NATO must “scale up together to produce more and at lower the cost.”
Allies will also address NATO’s air-defense gaps. The alliance has been pressed for a reaction by countries on the eastern flank, where several breaches of their airspace by Russian drones have taken place in recent weeks.
--With assistance from Katharina Rosskopf.
(Updates with additional comments from Rutte from seventh paragraph.)
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