Rich Lowry: Don't Cry for Angela Merkel

Angela Merkel is, her supporters like to gloat, the leader of the free world.

Just don’t ask her to spend as if she is.

Donald Trump has made the German chancellor one of his favorite rhetorical targets, especially over Germany’s anemic defense expenditures. This has led to worries about the future of the trans-Atlantic alliance and reflexive support for Merkel among the American political elite.

Trump shouldn’t openly mock Merkel or suggest that there have been annual dues to NATO that Germany has failed to pay. Trump tends to view foreign countries like contractors trying to scam him in a development deal. This scants history, geo-strategy and the national pride of other countries — as usual, Trump would benefit from at least a gesture toward statesmanship.

Yet Germany’s defense spending, or lack thereof, is a disgrace. One would think the country would have been embarrassed onto a different trajectory after German troops — Panzergrenadierbataillon 371, to be exact — had to use broomsticks instead of guns in a NATO exercise in 2014. But Germany evidently doesn’t embarrass easily.

NATO countries, after a long vacation from history after the end of the Cold War, agreed at a summit in Wales in 2014 to spend 2% of their gross domestic product on defense annually within 10 years.

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