Meloni Urges NATO to Rethink Its Defense Priorities

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has announced that Rome will increase defense and security spending to around 2.8% of GDP next year, but urged NATO allies not to focus solely on the volume of spending when assessing defense capabilities.

Addressing parliament, she said the war in Ukraine had demonstrated a fundamental transformation of modern warfare. Military power, she argued, is no longer determined solely by traditional weapons systems, but increasingly by drones, satellites and data.

Meloni pointed to the situation on the Ukrainian front, where cheap drones are capable of destroying equipment worth millions of euros. The West, she said, should reflect on the importance of new technologies and the protection of data infrastructure. She also warned that some countries are already preparing young people to remotely operate drones for future conflicts.

The debate on defense budgets is resonating across Europe more broadly. British Defense Secretary John Healey resigned on Thursday following a row over military funding, and Italian Defense Minister Guido Crosetto said several of his colleagues face similar dilemmas.

(reuters, bak)