European powers draft plan to replace US military role in NATO within a decade

Europe's largest military powers have begun structured discussions on how to assume the defence burdens currently carried by the United States within NATO, according to a report in the Financial Times citing four officials directly involved. The talks, which include the United Kingdom, France, Germany and several Nordic governments, aim to produce a framework for a managed transfer of responsibilities over a five to ten year horizon. The intention is to present the plan to the Trump administration before the alliance's annual leaders' summit in The Hague this June.

The American footprint that Europe must replace

The scale of the task is evident in the numbers. The United States contributes 15.8 percent of NATO's annual civil and military budget of $3.5 billion, but its military contribution goes far beyond cash. Between 80,000 and 100,000 American service personnel are stationed across Europe, providing the backbone of the alliance's deterrence posture. They operate the bulk of the alliance's strategic airlift, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assets, ballistic missile defence architecture, and the nuclear sharing arrangements that underwrite European security. Replacing those capabilities is not simply a matter of spending more; it requires building entirely new command structures, logistics chains and industrial capacity.

One official quoted by the Financial Times described the mood bluntly: "Increasing spending is the only play that we have: burden sharing and shifting the dial away from US reliance. We're starting those talks but it's such a big task that many are overwhelmed by the scale of it." The remark captures both the determination and the anxiety inside European defence ministries. For decades, European capitals have accepted American military leadership as a given. The prospect of a US president who openly questions the value of the alliance has forced a reckoning that many had deferred since the end of the Cold War.

Five capability gaps identified by NATO planners

Bloomberg reported on Friday that NATO's military authorities have identified five priority areas where allied stockpiles and capabilities must grow by roughly 30 percent. They are air defence systems, deep-fire capacities, logistics, communication and information systems, and land manoeuvre capacities. Air defence was singled out as an area requiring more capability from all allies, including the United States. The shortfall is not abstract: European air defences remain heavily dependent on American Patriot batteries and the Aegis Ashore installations in Romania and Poland. Deep-fire, the ability to strike targets at long range with precision, is another domain where European arsenals are thin compared with the US inventory of long-range missiles and stealth platforms.

Logistics and communications are the unglamorous but decisive enablers. The US military runs the strategic airlift and sealift that would move heavy formations across the Atlantic in a crisis. European armies have neither the transport aircraft nor the pre-positioned equipment stocks to conduct large-scale operations without American support. Communication and information systems, including secure satellite links and battlefield management networks, are similarly US-centric. Land manoeuvre capacity, the ability to deploy and sustain heavy armoured formations, has atrophied in many European armies after years of counter-insurgency operations in Afghanistan and Mali.

Spending pledges and the industrial base

Germany, France and the United Kingdom have all announced significant increases in defence spending since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Germany's Zeitenwende speech by Chancellor Olaf Scholz in February 2022 promised a 100 billion euro special fund and a commitment to meet the NATO target of two percent of GDP annually. France's 2024-2030 military programming law sets out a 413 billion euro budget, a 40 percent increase over the previous cycle. The UK's 2023 defence command paper committed to spending 2.5 percent of GDP on defence by 2030. Yet officials caution that money alone does not produce capabilities quickly. Procurement cycles for complex systems, frigates, armoured vehicles, air defence batteries, run to a decade or more. The European defence industrial base, fragmented across national champions and duplicated programmes, struggles to absorb rapid increases in orders.

The European Commission has attempted to address fragmentation through the European Defence Fund and the Act in Support of Ammunition Production, but progress is slow. Joint procurement remains the exception rather than the rule. The Financial Times report suggests that the current discussions among the UK, France, Germany and the Nordics are informal precisely because formal EU structures move too slowly and because the UK, as a non-EU member, must be included from the start. Any credible European pillar of NATO requires British participation, given the UK's nuclear deterrent, its expeditionary capabilities and its intelligence assets.

Political divisions and the Trump factor

Not all European officials are convinced that a US withdrawal is imminent. Some told the Financial Times they believe President Trump's rhetoric is transactional, pressure to extract higher European spending, rather than a genuine intention to leave the alliance. Others argue that the unpredictability of the current administration makes hedging essential regardless of intent. The divide mirrors a broader strategic disagreement: whether Europe should pursue strategic autonomy as a long-term goal or merely seek to be a more capable partner within a US-led alliance. France has historically championed the former; Germany and the Nordics have been more cautious, wary of duplicating NATO structures and of alienating Washington.

The UK occupies a distinct position. As the European ally with the closest military ties to the United States, Britain has traditionally acted as a bridge. Since Brexit, London has emphasised its commitment to European security through bilateral agreements and the Joint Expeditionary Force with Nordic and Baltic partners. The inclusion of the UK in these talks signals that the participating governments recognise a European defence framework cannot function without British capabilities, but also that London wants a seat at the table shaping whatever emerges.

The June deadline and the Hague summit

The target date for presenting a framework is the NATO summit in The Hague on 24-25 June. That gives officials roughly three months to turn informal conversations into a document credible enough to show to the Americans. The summit will also address the 30 percent stockpile increase requested by NATO's military authorities, the next round of defence spending targets, and the alliance's posture towards Russia. The war in Ukraine, now in its fourth year, has already forced NATO to adopt new regional defence plans and to establish a persistent presence on its eastern flank. Those plans assume American enablers. If the US contribution shrinks, the plans must be rewritten.

European officials are aware that a poorly prepared proposal would undermine the very credibility they are trying to build. The Financial Times sources emphasised that the discussions are at an early stage. No final figures have been agreed, no burden-sharing formula has been settled, and no legal framework has been drafted. The five to ten year horizon reflects a realistic assessment of how long it takes to field new capabilities, not a political deadline. But the existence of structured talks at all marks a shift. For the first time since the alliance was founded in 1949, the principal European powers are planning for a NATO in which the United States is not the indispensable partner.