THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS – JUNE 25: NATO heads of state and government pose for an official “family photo” on the second day of the 2025 NATO Summit on June 25, 2025 in The Hague, Netherlands. Among other matters, members are to approve a new defense investment plan that raises the target for defense spending to 5% of GDP. (Photo by Omar Havana/Getty Images)
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Next week, dozens of elected officials, defense ministers, and policymakers will gather in Ankara, Turkey, for the 2026 NATO Summit. During the two-day event, representatives from NATO’s 32 member states will discuss methods to further strengthen the Alliance, as well as the importance of national security and defense spending. NATO members will hope that the meetings held at the forum in Ankara will help “make NATO a stronger, fairer, and more lethal Alliance, ready to respond to the critical challenges to [NATO’s] security.”
Ahead of the NATO Summit in Ankara, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte spoke at an Atlantic Council event on June 25, highlighting three main priorities for the gathering on July 7-8. During the panel, the Secretary General shared that NATO would focus on “transforming defense investment within the Alliance, defense industry innovation, and continued support for Ukraine.” He added that NATO allies would announce tens of billions of dollars in defense-related deals at the summit, and that Alliance members would assess defense spending targets.
Investments in national security and defense have been a common theme at NATO summits, and this topic was a key point during the 2025 NATO Summit. When representatives from NATO’s member states gathered in The Hague last year, U.S. President Donald Trump proposed a defense spending increase. Alliance members agreed to a “new commitment to spend 5 percent of [their respective] gross domestic product[s] on defense by 2035.” This figure was then broken into two parts. The first portion of the 5% GDP defense spending is 3.5%, which focuses on core defense, such as military equipment and weapons. The remaining 1.5% of GDP in defense spending is allocated to security-related matters, such as infrastructure for military purposes, cybersecurity, and strengthening the defense industrial base. NATO members also agreed that part of the 5% of GDP spent by each country on defense would include weapons and ammunition sent by NATO members to Ukraine.
There was pushback on the decision to increase NATO’s defense spending GDP target during the 2025 NATO Summit. Prior to the gathering, NATO members had agreed to a 2% of GDP threshold for defense spending at the 2014 NATO Summit. But by 2025, only 23 out of NATO’s 32 members reached the 2% goal. Critics of the increased defense spending goal thus argued that it would be difficult for NATO members to reach the 5% target if they had not even reached the 2% target. One year later, this defense spending issue remains. Spain, the most vocal critic of defense spending during the 2025 NATO Summit, only just reached the 2% GDP spending threshold. A report by POLITICO on June 17 noted that Spain has “refused to commit to the Alliance’s 5 percent spending target.” The same POLITICO report stated that Czechia, Hungary, Slovenia, and the United Kingdom have made little progress on defense spending following the discussions held and agreements made at the 2025 NATO Summit.
Rutte said there is a “strong commitment to get defence spending to 5% of GDP by 2035,” but given that some NATO members have not made progress over the past year, it will be important to see how they respond at the 2026 NATO Summit. During the Atlantic Council event on June 25, the NATO Secretary General noted that he hopes to help NATO members create a “credible path” toward the 5% target. It will therefore be interesting to see how the defense spending topics will unfold during the 2026 NATO Summit.
Another topic of debate during the gathering in Ankara will be NATO’s support for Ukraine. During the 2025 NATO Summit, Rutte proposed a plan for Alliance members to allocate 0.25% of their respective GDPs on military assistance for Ukraine. The proposal, however, was rejected by Canada, France, Italy, Spain, and the United Kingdom. Despite this, NATO members have continued to provide defense, financial, humanitarian, and medical assistance to Ukraine. Most recently, in April, NATO members pledged to provide $60 billion in military aid to Ukraine. This is in line with NATO’s previous actions, where members of the organization have sent tens of billions of dollars’ worth of defense assistance to Ukraine since Russia’s full-scale invasion began in February 2022. The U.S. under Trump also introduced a program last year where American weapons are sold to NATO allies in Europe, which are then sent to Ukraine.
As for the 2026 NATO Summit, Rutte announced that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will be attending the two-day event in Ankara. The Secretary General added that NATO’s “security is interlinked” with Ukraine’s. Supporters of Ukraine and defense policy analysts will be curious to see what other commitments NATO will make with Ukraine during the 2026 NATO Summit, particularly during the NATO-Ukraine Council and the Ukraine Defence Contact Group.
Finally, NATO members will look to discuss the progress they have made in defense industry innovation. For example, NATO’s Defence Innovation Accelerator for the North Atlantic seeks to “find and accelerate innovation to provide defence and security effects for the Alliance.” The organization awarded a research and development contract in April to a UK-based technology company that specializes in undersea robotics. DIANA is hopeful that it will be able to award other R&D and prototype contracts to other companies, which would help NATO members reduce “administrative barriers and accelerat[e] adoption timelines.”
Furthermore, Rutte said at the June 25 Atlantic Council event that Alliance members will further discuss defense industry innovation at the 2026 NATO Summit. Representatives from companies involved in the defense industrial complex and technology experts will be curious to see how NATO will expand on defense innovation, burden-sharing, and defense cooperation.
In short, representatives from NATO’s member countries will be called upon to address current challenges facing defense spending, defense innovation, and national security. They will also examine NATO’s ongoing support for Ukraine and discuss what else can be done to bring peace in Ukraine amid Russia’s ongoing full-scale invasion.
After some contention over the decision to increase defense spending at last year’s summit, Rutte will hope to keep all 32 Alliance members aligned on their defense and national security priorities at the upcoming summit in Ankara. What NATO’s members agree to during the 2026 NATO Summit remains to be seen.
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