WASHINGTON (CHATNEWSTV) — United States Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth pressed his French counterpart Thursday to meet higher defense spending targets and assume greater responsibility for Europe’s security, as the two met for high-level talks at the Pentagon.
“It was an excellent meeting today with my French counterpart,” Hegseth said following his discussion with French Armed Forces Minister Sébastien Lecornu. “We discussed the imperative need for Europeans to meet a 5% defense spending commitment to restore deterrence with ready, lethal conventional forces.”
The leaders also discussed NATO’s evolving role, particularly in taking primary responsibility for Europe’s conventional defense, and shared efforts to achieve a durable peace in Ukraine.
Hegseth’s remarks continue a theme he emphasized publicly after a NATO defense ministers’ meeting in Brussels in February, when he urged European allies — including France — to take “security ownership” and reduce reliance on the United States.
“Our expectation of our friends, and we say this in solidarity, is you have to spend more on your defense, for your country, on that continent,” he said at the time. “There can’t any longer be an expectation of the U.S. as the permanent guarantor of European security.”
Lecornu described the Thursday meeting as “productive” in a social media post.
Editor: Gabriel Ani
