Davos (Brussels Morning Newspaper) – NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte asked the United States to keep supplying weapons to Ukraine and said Europe would cover the costs.
Talking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Mark Rutte stated the alliance must invest more in defense, increase defense industrial production and contribute a bigger share of spending on help for Ukraine.
“On Ukraine, we need the U.S. also to stay involved,”
Rutte expressed.
“If this new Trump administration is willing to keep on supplying Ukraine from its defense industrial base, the bill will be paid by the Europeans, I’m absolutely convinced of this, we have to be willing to do that,”
He said.
In Davos, Rutte also stated it was important Russia did not succeed as it could result in Russian President Vladimir Putin ‘high fiving’ the leaders of China and North Korea. “We really have to step up and not scale back our support for Ukraine,” the NATO chief expressed. “The frontline is moving in the wrong direction,” he said.
How has President Trump criticized Europe’s support for Ukraine?
Earlier this week, U.S. President Donald Trump accused the European Union of not doing its part to bolster Ukraine amid Russia’s ongoing incursion. Mr. Trump maintained that Europe should really up its funding efforts to back Ukraine, declaring that the United States has invested much more than the E.U. into the defense effort of Ukraine. Mr. Trump said that so far, it has given an amount of close to $200 billion more to Ukraine than the EU had given.
How much has the US committed to Ukraine’s security assistance?
To date, through January 2025, the United States has committed more than $66.5 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since the beginning of the Biden administration and about $65.9 billion since Russia’s invasion on February 24, 2022. The United States recently has made announcements on significant packages of military aid and a commitment of $1.25 billion in military assistance that contains missile defense systems components as well as extra artillery shells.