Tri-Service

Is Europe Pulling Its Weight In Military Spending?

The American ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power, says she is concerned about European countries' share of NATO's military burden.

Ms Power told BBC Radio 4's Today programme:

"I'm not coming to Europe to tell any single country how much to spend or where to spend it, but I am observing that there is a gap between the collective security needs that we all have and the resources that we are bringing to bear."

"This is concerning," she continued. "The number of missions that require advanced militaries to contribute around the world is growing, not shrinking," she said - pointing to the coalition against Islamic State or the fight to control the Ebola outbreak in West Africa.

"The leaders of the Nato countries agreed to a 2% allocation. Not only is that number only met, I think, by two countries besides ourselves [the United States] in the Alliance, but in most countries the amount of defence spending is shrinking."

Forces TV, meanwhile, has taken a look at the respective military budgets of the United States and NATO's biggest military spenders in Europe, as of the latest report from think-tank the International Institute for Strategic Studies, which looks at figures from the year 2014.

(All figures converted from US Dollars to British Pound Sterling using www.xe.com)