US secretary of state Marco Rubio has said increased military funding is a sign “Europe can awaken from its long slumber”. Speaking in Greece, America’s top diplomat highlighted the commitment made by the UK and other Nato members last year to hike defence spending to 5% of economic output by 2035 in the face of burgeoning threats from Russia and China, and demands by US President Donald Trump that allies make a bigger contribution to their own security.
Pressure on UK to meet target
The British Government is under pressure to set out how it will meet the target, amid reports Prime Minister Andy Burnham is looking at delaying an announcement on a key funding milestone.
Mr Rubio also said that while “passions” had strained ties between the US and Europe, they “must not be allowed to break them” as he highlighted the importance of a strong alliance in “confronting the threats of our age”. Standing in front of the ruins of the Acropolis, Mr Rubio linked the values of ancient Greece to the US president’s “America First” agenda.
Classical understanding of statecraft
The former Republican senator has been tipped as a frontrunner for his party’s nomination in next year’s race for the White House. Pointing out that the ancient Greeks understood that nations have interests, Mr Rubio said: “They understood that power requires not only having the means to defend yourself, it requires the credibility that you are willing to use it.”
“This is the classical understanding of politics and of statecraft that the Trump administration hopes to reclaim – reclaim not just for our country, but for the whole of our civilisation,” he said. “We believe that Europe can awaken from its long slumber and rekindle the fire that was lit here millennia ago.”
“There are already signs,” he added. “Across this continent, we are witnessing what we hope will be the beginnings of a generational shift – skyrocketing defence spending, a flurry of new partnerships and programmes, expanded manufacturing and production, following on the historic defence commitments made last year in The Hague.”
Alliance stronger than sum of parts
Mr Rubio added: “Though passions may, at times, have strained the bonds of affection between the United States and Europe, it must not be allowed to break them. Together, we must strengthen an alliance capable of confronting threats of our age. And we can. Because we do not believe the transatlantic friendship should be zero sum. Quite the opposite. Our vision is of an alliance whose strength is greater than the sum of its parts.”
He highlighted the “unprecedented” agreement recently struck between the US, Denmark and Greenland over the Arctic territory. Mr Rubio said: “All three partners in that deal emerged victorious. All of Europe, and Nato and the United States emerged safer, stronger, and more secure because of it. We want to win together. We must win together.”
The secretary of state also warned that the West had come “to feel ashamed of the very things that made us exceptional”. He said: “We felt embarrassed that our achievements set us apart from the rest of the world. Our prosperity somehow became a source of guilt. We no longer believed we deserved and had earned our greatness.”
“The word ‘nationalism’ became a dirty word. And so we tore down our monuments, we condemned our own history. And in too many places, we taught our children to be ashamed of the countries they would inherit. In the process, we opened our borders and outsourced our industry, and allowed our militaries to wither and to decay.”
Western civilisation at a crossroads
In the meantime, rivals and adversaries had filled “the vacuum left behind by our weakness”, Mr Rubio said. Arguing Western civilisation was “at a crossroads”, he said: “The course we take will determine whether the West maintains its place at the head of the world or resigns itself to a future of atrophy and servitude and decline. We will either choose to act now or lose the choice to act at all.”
“Under President Trump, the United States has made its choice. We choose the unapologetic pursuit of national power – to take back control of our critical supply chains, to reindustrialise our economy, to rebuild our defence, to fight for dominance of the technologies and industries of the future.”
Mr Rubio added: “It has become fashionable today to believe that enlightened foreign policy means prioritising the global community over one’s own people. And I think here, too, we have much to learn from the men of ancient Greece because they knew that there was nothing selfish or wrong about loyalty to your nation, nor anything selfish or wrong about fighting to defend its interests above all else.”
But in making the case for nationalism he also stressed the importance of partnerships in the face of war, terrorism and global competition. Mr Rubio said: “And so we must rebuild our institutions and our alliances to face these threats together – understanding that the purpose of these things is not to abolish the sovereignty of the nations that constitute them, it is to defend them. And that nations need not abandon their distinct identities in order to recognise their common interests.”
