INVESTIGATION: Belgium Crosses the 2% NATO Threshold — and Reveals Everything That Number Conceals

Introduction: The Symbol and the Void Behind It

A threshold reached under pressure, not conviction

On June 18, 2026, in Brussels, NATO defense ministers were meeting at Alliance headquarters to prepare for the upcoming Ankara summit in July. In the corridors, a piece of news circulated quietly, almost unremarkable for having been announced so many times: Belgium had finally reached the target of 2% of GDP devoted to defense. For the first time in its NATO history. Twelve years after the solemn commitment made in Wales in 2014. Two years after the official 2024 deadline. The threshold has been crossed — but the manner in which it was crossed, and what it conceals, warrant serious investigation.

Here is the truth that official communiqués do not shout: Belgium has reached the strict required minimum, exactly 2%, and finds itself in the same group as Spain, Portugal, Luxembourg, and the Czech Republic — the nations that did just enough to avoid being singled out at the summit. According to Alliance data published in March 2026, Belgium was still devoting 1.27% of its GDP to defense in 2024 and was hovering around 1% five years ago. The 2025 leap is real, even spectacular in relative terms — but it tells only part of the story. The investigation starts here.

Seven F-16s for Ukraine: the display and the shifting timeline

That same June 18, Belgian Defense Minister Theo Francken announced before cameras, even before the ministerial session opened, that Belgium would deliver seven F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine in 2026. Three operational aircraft capable of defending Ukrainian skies against Shahed drones and Russian cruise missiles. Four more to provide spare parts. More than initially promised — the original plan had envisaged only four aircraft for parts. President Zelensky, received by Prime Minister De Wever and King Philippe that same Thursday in Brussels, welcomed the announcement on X: "We also examined the schedule for F-16 fighter deliveries. The first ones will arrive this year. This kind of air defense assistance is what is needed most right now."

But this announcement also raises a fundamental question: how can a country that was still struggling to finance its own national defense simultaneously commit to donating an entire fleet of fifty-three F-16s to Ukraine? The answer lies precisely in Belgian defense financing — its mechanisms, its contradictions, and its deadlines. That is what this investigation intends to dissect.

Belgium's Long Denial: Twenty Years of Assumed Under-Funding

From 1% to 2%: an out-of-the-ordinary trajectory

To understand the scale of the ground covered — and of what remains — one must look at the figures without illusion. In 2021, Belgium devoted 1.12% of its GDP to defense, equivalent to 5.337 billion euros according to NATO data. In 2023, the figure stagnated at 1.1%, placing the country second-to-last in Alliance spending rankings, just ahead of Luxembourg. In 2024, it barely scraped up to 1.27%. Then, in 2025, the great leap: exactly 2%. An increase in the defense budget of 57.4% in a single year, according to NATO data. That figure is vertiginous — and reveals the depth of accumulated backlog.

How was this leap financed? The mechanisms reveal as much as the amounts. According to information published in the Belgian press, the 2025 "Easter Agreement" mobilized 3.9 billion euros in additional funding for 2025 alone, as part of a total package of 21.3 billion euros. The funding sources are telling: taxes on frozen Russian assets held at Euroclear, dividends from public-sector shareholdings, potential asset sales, and — that politically explosive detail — cuts to certain social benefits, including adjustments to unemployment allowances and pension reforms. Budget Minister Vincent Van Peteghem had confirmed this in 2025 to the Financial Times: defense would be financed through debt and structural reforms.

The Francken paradox: a proactive minister facing a divided coalition

Minister Theo Francken (N-VA) has been the engine of this transformation. His statement to the Belgian press in June 2025 had the merit of frankness: "For years, we ignored the NATO 2% standard. Belgium was not contributing sufficiently. In a way, we were relying on others to ensure our security. But that attitude belongs to the past." A rare mea culpa in Belgian diplomatic vocabulary. A 180-degree turn on a posture the country had cultivated for two decades.

But in May 2026, according to the Belga agency, tensions were re-emerging within the coalition over the pace of defense spending. Parties such as CD&V and Vooruit, confronting general budget pressure, wanted to slow the pace of military investments. Francken resisted, publicly defending compliance with NATO commitments. This internal fracture illustrates a structural problem: Belgium decided to defend itself by political decree, without having yet built the social and fiscal consensus needed to sustain this effort over time.

The European Rankings: Bottom of the Class Among the "Good Students"

Poland versus Belgium: the symbolic gulf between 4.48% and 2%

The data published by the Alliance and synthesized by the Brussels Times on June 18, 2026, paints an unsparing picture of Belgium's position in Europe's defense landscape. Poland — NATO's geographical front line against the Russian threat — devotes 4.48% of its GDP to defense, surpassing even the United States at 3.19%. Lithuania is at 4%, Latvia at 3.73%, Estonia at 3.38%. These Baltic and Eastern European countries are not playing with symbols: they are building real barriers against an armed and demonstrably aggressive neighbor. Belgium, at precisely 2%, finds itself in the same group as Spain and Portugal — the states that did exactly the minimum to avoid being pointed at.

According to Oxford Economics cited by the Brussels Times, to reach the target of 3.5% of GDP in pure military spending set at the Hague summit in June 2025, Belgium would need to increase its defense spending by an additional 1.5 percentage points of GDP. In a country whose budget deficit exceeded 5% of GDP in 2024 according to the National Bank of Belgium, this equation is genuinely vertiginous. An analysis cited in international press notes that Belgium would face the most demanding proportional increase challenge among major NATO economies, requiring nearly a tripling of its defense effort relative to its historical baseline to reach the 5% target by 2035.

The Hague context: when NATO decides to raise the bar even higher

The June 2025 Hague summit adopted the Hague Defence Investment Plan, raising the collective target to 5% of GDP by 2035: 3.5% for strictly military spending and 1.5% for related investments — infrastructure, defense industry, cybersecurity, resilience. A historic choice, wrested under the combined pressure of Trump and the security context — the war in Ukraine having demonstrated starkly what an under-equipped army looks like against an industrial military power.

Belgium, according to information available at the time, had not challenged this new course but had requested "maximum flexibility." Francken had announced that he wanted a ten-year plan, not imposed annual increases. "Almost no country contests the necessity of moving to 5%. But we will ask for flexibility. We have already made an enormous effort, and it will not be easy to do even more." In plain language: Belgium acknowledges the direction, but negotiates the pace. This is honest. It is also a way of deferring a problem that geography and history make urgent.

The 2026–2034 Strategic Plan: 34 Billion Euros on Paper

An ambitious program, fragile funding

The De Wever government published in June 2025 its strategic defense vision for 2026–2034, presented as "the largest investment in defense in forty years." The headline figure: 34.2 billion euros in capability investments over the period. Among the concrete elements: the purchase of 10 NASAMS systems from Kongsberg for 2 billion euros (orders in 2026), designed to finally give Belgium a ground-based air defense capability of which it is currently entirely devoid. In parallel, Belgium confirmed the manufacture of rear sections for the F-35 fighter jet, illustrating the articulation between national defense and the defense industry.

But the solidity of the funding warrants critical scrutiny. According to analysis published by the think tank Defence Belgium in February 2026, commitment credits total 20.1 billion euros — far below the announced 34 billion. The government itself specifies that it is the defense effort in the broad sense — not the Defense budget strictly speaking — that will be maintained at 2% of GDP. This accounting distinction is crucial: it includes items such as military pensions, law enforcement spending, and infrastructure investments. Pure military effort is in reality lower than the displayed figure.

Innovation as a diversification axis

On June 11, 2026, a week before the NATO ministerial meeting, Francken additionally announced an investment plan of 3.7 billion euros in defense innovation over the next decade. The stated objective: strengthen research and development, consolidate the national defense industry. A coherent approach given the growing imperative of industrial sovereignty in the military domain — a lesson drawn from the war in Ukraine, where industrial bottlenecks have sometimes been as decisive as operational capabilities on the ground.

According to data from the IISS (Military Balance 2026) cited by BNP Paribas Economic Research, Belgium is among the European countries that have most strongly increased their defense spending in relative terms since 2024, with a rise of 59%. Behind Denmark (+114%) but ahead of Spain (+43%) and Sweden (+31%). These figures illustrate a structural movement in European defense — but they also start from such a low baseline for countries like Belgium that the catch-up, however spectacular, remains relative to actual needs.

The F-16s for Ukraine: A Promise With Multiple Twists

Thirty jets promised in 2024, seven delivered in 2026

Under the bilateral security agreement signed in May 2024, Belgium committed to transferring thirty F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine by 2028. A year and a half later, the scorecard was thin: not a single aircraft delivered. Prime Minister De Wever had, during a visit to Kyiv last year, sketched a timeline — which had not been honored. In October 2025, Francken acknowledged that a minimum additional delay of one year was unavoidable, conditioned on the arrival of the F-35s ordered from the United States to replace the F-16s in NATO air defense and nuclear doctrine missions.

The June 18, 2026 announcement thus marks a first concrete unblocking. Seven aircraft this year: three operational to defend Ukrainian skies, and four serving as parts donors to keep the F-16s already deployed by other European nations operational. Francken's stated ambition goes even further: "I will propose to the government that we send all our F-16s to Ukraine in the coming years. It depends on receiving our F-35s. We have our role in NATO's nuclear doctrine, and we need the F-35s in place before we can deliver the F-16s. But the first F-16s are coming."

The complete roadmap: 2026–2030 and the fleet of 53 aircraft

According to information published by the Brussels Times on June 18, 2026, the full transfer plan for Belgium's fleet to Ukraine would unfold over four years: 7 aircraft in 2026, approximately twenty more in 2027–2028, and the remainder of the 53-F-16 fleet by 2030. At this pace, Belgium would honor its initial commitment to Ukraine, with a delayed but amplified intent. Belgium had initially planned thirty aircraft — if all 53 F-16s are transferred, the commitment would be significantly exceeded. But the formal decision on the additional 23 aircraft would not be made until 2028.

It should be noted that most Belgian F-16s will serve primarily as spare parts reservoirs for the fleets already operational in Ukraine, according to specialists' estimates. The intense wear of aircraft under real combat conditions, combined with supply difficulties, makes these component donors as valuable as airworthy fighters. Zelensky emphasized this explicitly in his Brussels exchanges: air defense remains the absolute priority, and every F-16 — operational or not — contributes to keeping it alive.

The June 18, 2026 NATO Meeting: The Macro-Security Context

Rutte, Hegseth, and the logic of "NATO 3.0"

The June 18, 2026 defense ministers' meeting was not an ordinary event. It was — in Secretary General Mark Rutte's own words — "the last major meeting before the Ankara summit." A summit centered on implementing the Hague commitments: the trajectory toward 5% of GDP, strengthening the transatlantic defense industry, and continued support for Ukraine. Rutte had summarized the scale of the ongoing movement: "European allies and Canada are spending more than 90 billion additional dollars in 2025 compared to 2024, an increase of almost 20% in defense spending in a single year. What we are seeing is stunning."

U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth called for a "NATO 3.0" capable of deterring any threat. He announced that the United States would invest $1.5 trillion in defense in 2027. More significant for European allies: he had stated that annual U.S. contributions to NATO would now be conditioned on other members meeting their spending commitments. A major political signal: the era of free-riding is definitively over. Countries like Belgium, which long benefited from collective security without paying a fair share, are receiving the message.

The Ukraine Defense Contact Group: one billion dollars announced

That same June 18, the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, co-chaired by Germany and the United Kingdom with Zelensky's participation, announced cumulative commitments estimated at 4 billion dollars. Germany brought an additional 400 million for Ukraine's air defense, including 200 million for PAC-3 Patriot missiles via the Jumpstart mechanism. Sweden contributed 108 million through the PURL program. The Netherlands announced a package of 500 million euros, including 250 million for Ukrainian drones and 250 million for PURL.

Belgium, for its part, confirmed its contribution to the PURL program — the American-NATO initiative allowing European allies to purchase American equipment for Ukraine. The announcement of the seven F-16s fits within this broader context of a West that, confronting the permanent threat Putin poses to Europe, is attempting to coordinate its military support in an ever more systematic way. Total allied support for Ukraine, artillery, ammunition, and assistance combined, was counted in billions — in Rutte's own formula.

Belgian Defense Financing: What the Mechanisms Reveal

Creative accounting as method

Analysis of Belgian defense effort financing reveals a complex reality that a simple GDP percentage fails to describe. The 2025 "Easter Agreement" mobilized taxes on frozen Russian assets at Euroclear — an exceptional political and financial tool, directly linked to Putin's war against Ukraine. This revenue source is by nature temporary and situational. It does not constitute a durable foundation for a defense effort supposed to last until 2033 at 2% of GDP and until 2034 at 2.5%.

The National Bank of Belgium had warned as early as 2024 that the country's budget deficit would exceed 5% of GDP in 2026. In this context, financing a structural and lasting increase of 0.7 percentage points of GDP devoted to defense — that is the gap between 1.3% in 2024 and 2% in 2025 — requires difficult political choices. Minister Van Peteghem made it explicit: increased debt, potential privatizations, social reforms. This is where the 2% is actually paid — not only in tanks and aircraft, but in political trade-offs that affect ordinary Belgian citizens.

The contribution to NATO forces: filling the American void

The Atlantic Council, in its NATO spending tracking tool updated on June 20, 2026, noted that ahead of the Ankara summit, new projections showed European allies surpassing earlier defense spending expectations. For the first time in NATO's recorded history, a European ally — Norway — was surpassing the United States in defense spending per capita. This symbolic signal illustrates a fundamental geopolitical rebalancing: Europe is beginning to assume its own security.

Reuters, cited in the June 18 synthesis of Francken's announcement, highlighted that Belgium was contributing more to NATO rapid reaction forces, notably by filling gaps created by the partial withdrawal of American commitments, with its F-16s and MQ-9B SkyGuardian drones. This operational dimension surpasses mere GDP percentage counting. It says something important: Belgium is beginning to be militarily useful to the Alliance, not merely present on paper.

The Shadow of the Past: The Years of Assumed Free-Riding

When Belgium championed "peace through military poverty"

To understand the current paradigm shift, one must face the denial of previous years squarely. As recently as February 2023, Defense Minister Ludivine Dedonder admitted before her counterparts in Brussels: "The 2%, we cannot meet it." She pleaded for "realism." At that point, Belgium was devoting 1.02% of its GDP to defense, under the STAR plan that aimed to reach... 1.57% by 2030. The total war had already begun in Ukraine in 2022, and the reality of the threat was plain for all to see. This institutional blindness deserves documentation, not erasure.

Even more revealing: in April 2024, Prime Minister Alexander De Croo was calling it an ambitious objective to reach 2% by 2029, versus 2035 provided in the governmental vision. Five years of difference, on a target set ten years earlier. Belgian defense policy was structured around an implicit logic: others will pay for collective security, we will economize on our contribution. Francken himself named it bluntly: "free-riding." This is both courageous as an admission and damning as a diagnosis.

The price of capability backlog

This backlog is measured not only in percentages. It is measured in absent military capabilities. Until the 2025 strategic agreement, Belgium had no ground-based air defense on its national territory. Zero. It depended entirely on its allies to protect its airspace against ballistic or cruise missiles. In a world where Ukraine is bombed every night by armadas of Shahed drones and Kinzhal missiles, this gap is not theoretical — it is existential. The purchase of ten NASAMS systems for 2 billion euros corrects this situation only partially and with a horizon of 2027–2028.

BNP Paribas Economic Research, in its analysis of June 17, 2026, noted that Europe as a whole would need to spend 80 additional billion euros in 2026 to reach 2.5% of collective GDP in defense spending. Belgium is part of this continental movement. But it starts with the handicap of a durably under-equipped army, whose defense production lines need rebuilding, and whose personnel numbers were reduced for years under austerity policies. The 2% reached is a starting point, not a finishing line.

The Allies Who Lead by Example: The Lesson of the Baltics and Poland

When geography imposes lucidity

Understanding why some countries spend 4% of their GDP on defense while others struggle to reach 2% requires looking at the map. Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania share a direct border — or immediate proximity — with Russia or Belarus. They have integrated into their political and budget culture the idea that sovereignty is paid for in steel, uniforms, and ammunition. Poland at 4.48% is a country that has seen its neighbors invaded in the 20th century and refuses, in all its forms, to let history repeat itself. No ideological abstraction there: memory transformed into doctrine.

Belgium, for its part, is 1,200 kilometers from the Ukrainian front. This geographic distance has long been — consciously or not — a psychological explanation for its disengagement. Why spend for a war that seems distant? The answer Ukraine has provided since 2022, and that Russia's destabilization strategy confirms every day — cyberattacks, electoral interference, sabotage, disinformation — is that geographic distance no longer protects in a world of long-range weapons and hybrid warfare. The security of Antwerp depends on the resistance of Kharkiv.

Solidarity as strategic interest

The June 18 announcements illustrate this collective awakening. Germany with its additional 400 million. Sweden with its fourth PURL commitment. The Netherlands with their 500 million euros. These contributions are not charity — they are investments in their own security. Every Patriot missile provided to Ukraine is one fewer Russian missile that could one day reach Tallinn, Vilnius, Warsaw, or — why not — Brussels. The logic is simple. It is also irrefutable.

Belgium took longer than others to integrate this logic. It is beginning to embrace it with the seven announced F-16s and the 2026–2034 strategic plan. But credibility is built over time, not through announcements. Belgium's forthcoming budget deadlines — in particular the decisions to be made in 2028 about the additional 23 F-16s and the trajectory toward 2.5% in 2034 — will tell whether this turning point is structural or circumstantial.

The 2% Threshold: A Cosmetic Accounting Measure or a Real Floor?

The academic critique of the NATO norm

It would be intellectually dishonest not to report the critical voices around the 2% standard. Researcher Yannick Quéau of GRIP (the Research and Information Group on Peace and Security), speaking in May 2026, recalled that the target "has no methodological foundation, except in a comparative perspective." He highlighted the Chinese example: officially 2% of GDP for defense, unofficially around 4%. Data transparency is therefore an inescapable variable in any NATO ranking. The 2% norm is politically useful for pressuring recalcitrant members, but it does not measure actual military power, nor the relevance of spending.

The critique is legitimate. What ultimately matters is operational capability: deployable units, available ammunition, interoperable weapons systems, command and intelligence capacities. A country that spends 2% of its GDP on military pensions and overhead is no more useful to the Alliance than a country at 1.8% that has invested heavily in power projection capabilities. Belgium itself, in its strategic vision, set the objective of investing 50% of its defense budget in equipment, thus surpassing the NATO norm of 20% for major materiel.

Why the symbol remains necessary despite its limits

Even if flawed, the 2% threshold fulfills an irreplaceable political function: it creates measurable conformity pressure. Without this benchmark, governments that under-fund their defense can always argue that their spending is "proportional to their needs." The 2% establishes a common, collectively negotiated reference that allows the Alliance to maintain a minimum discipline of investment. And in the context where the war in Ukraine proved that under-equipping is paid for in human lives, this discipline is not bureaucratic — it is existential.

By crossing this threshold, Belgium sends an important political signal to its allies, to Russia, and to its own public opinion. But the real test will not be in 2025 or 2026 — it will be in 2028, when budgetary pressures return and the temptation to reduce the defense effort will be strong. That is when we will know whether the Belgian strategic turning point is durable. In the meantime, the investigation continues.

Zelensky in Brussels: The Diplomacy of Resistance

A man who fights for his country, city by city, capital by capital

The presence of Volodymyr Zelensky in Brussels on June 18, 2026 was not incidental. On the sidelines of the European summit, the Ukrainian president met King Philippe, lunched at the Royal Palace, and discussed the F-16 delivery schedule one-on-one with De Wever. This physical presence in allied capitals is one of Zelensky's most effective diplomatic instruments since the start of the total war in 2022. There is something heroic in this capacity to maintain, under bombardment, high-intensity diplomacy — to transform his own political survival into a mobilization argument for Western democracies.

His words about the Belgian F-16s were measured but precise: "The first deliveries will arrive this year. This kind of air defense assistance is what is needed most right now." He is not boasting. He identifies a need — air defense — and works, tirelessly, to convince every ally to contribute. Belgium, despite its historical delays, is answering the call. Zelensky notes it. And the world watches.

Ukraine in the European security architecture

Ukraine's presence at the Defense Contact Group — with Minister Fedorov at the table alongside the 32 allies and partners — reflects a new political reality: Ukraine is de facto integrated into the Western security architecture, even without formal NATO membership. The bilateral security commitments signed by a dozen member states, the weapons deliveries, the training of Ukrainian pilots on F-16s — all of this constitutes a network of interdependencies that goes well beyond simple humanitarian aid.

For Belgium, the symbolic dimension of royal and governmental presence alongside Zelensky is not negligible. It says publicly: we are on the side of those who resist aggression. We choose international law over the law of the strongest. And we are paying for that choice — slowly, imperfectly, but genuinely — in aircraft, equipment, and euros. It is insufficient relative to Ukrainian needs. But it is a moral choice that commits a nation.

The Question of Hidden Costs: Who Really Pays for Belgian Rearmament?

Social cuts as indirect defense financing

The brutality of the Belgian debate about defense financing is revealing of a structural tension that runs through many European welfare states. When Vincent Van Peteghem declares in 2025 that the defense catch-up will proceed "through debt and structural reforms" including cuts to unemployment and pensions, he poses in stark terms a dilemma haunting all Western democracies: how to finance enhanced external security without sacrificing internal social cohesion? The question is legitimate — and politically incendiary.

Belgian left-wing parties, notably the Socialists, had from 2025 criticized the use of social cuts to supplement military budgets. Paul Magnette, head of the PS, demanded that Belgium maintain its effort at 2% without going further — a position that illustrates how the NATO norm inserts itself into domestic political fractures. On the right, Francken's N-VA argues that external security is the prerequisite for any social prosperity. Two visions reflecting a genuine divergence on the order of political priorities in a world that is becoming dangerous again.

GRIP and the debate on the relevance of the norm

Independent Belgian research is not absent from this debate. GRIP, in its May 2026 analyses, usefully nuanced: the 2% norm was designed in a comparative context, not as an automatic security guarantee. The truly relevant criterion would be that of concrete capabilities — what can the Belgian army do, within what timelines, for which missions? A deployable combat battalion available in 72 hours is worth more than a budget inflated by administrative spending. Belgium will need to demonstrate, in coming years, that its quantitative effort translates into qualitative capabilities.

The 2026–2034 strategic plan includes the order of 10 NASAMS systems, the transition to F-35s, investment in SkyGuardian drones, and the 3.7 billion innovation program. These purchases are concrete. They address identified capability gaps. But their effective delivery, operational integration, and in-service support will depend on political and financial continuity — the rarest resource in any coalition government like the one De Wever leads.

The Upcoming Ankara Summit: What Belgium Will Need to Deliver

The commitments on the table

The NATO summit in Ankara, scheduled for July 7–8, 2026, will be dominated by the question of implementing the Hague commitments. Rutte said it clearly on June 17: "This is the last major meeting before Ankara. And that summit will be entirely focused on delivery." For Belgium, this means presenting a credible and detailed plan for reaching 3.5% of GDP in pure military spending by a precise horizon, along with the total 5% by 2035. Yet the current plan foresees 2% until 2033 and 2.5% in 2034. The gap from the 3.5% target is substantial — and the strategic document itself acknowledges that the 3.5% objective "appears illusory" at the current trajectory.

According to the Atlantic Council in June 2026, new projections show European allies already surpassing earlier expectations for 2026. But "surpassing expectations" at the global level does not mask significant national disparities. Countries like Belgium, Spain, Portugal, and Luxembourg, which have done the strict minimum, cannot indefinitely shelter behind the Alliance's overall performance. Ankara will be a test of seriousness.

The credibility of a recently converted partner

Belgium arrives at Ankara with a mixed but clearly improving record. The achievement of 2% is real. The announcement of seven F-16s is concrete. The PURL engagement is formalized. The 34-billion plan is published. These are positive signals that partially restore the credibility of a country that lost much of it over two decades of under-investment. Prime Minister De Wever's formulation in 2025 summarized the stakes: "Coming to the NATO summit without the 2% would be barely credible." Belgium came with the 2%. That is the minimum. What follows belongs to those who will choose to govern this country in the coming years.

Ultimately, this investigation reveals a country in accelerated strategic transformation, compelled by events — the war in Ukraine, American pressure, the rise of hybrid threats — to revisit decades of military under-investment culture. The 2% threshold is not a trophy: it is a belated admission that collective security has a price, and that this price was for too long externalized onto others. Belgium is beginning to pay it. The real question is: how far will this conversion go?

Conclusion: The 2% as Starting Point, Not Finishing Line

A historic turning point, a conversion to confirm

On June 18, 2026, Belgium crossed a double threshold: symbolic, by reaching 2% of GDP devoted to defense for the first time in its modern NATO history; and operational, by announcing seven F-16s for Ukraine along with an increased contribution to the Alliance's rapid reaction forces. These decisions fit within a pivotal moment for Europe: the post-Cold War world, which had authorized two decades of tacit disarmament, is definitively over. The war in Ukraine proved this, harshly and irrefutably.

But this investigation also shows that Belgium's 2% is a fragile foundation, built on partially exceptional financing, weakened by internal political tensions, and far below the levels characterizing the most exposed and most invested allies. The distance separating Belgium from Poland — 2% versus 4.48% — is not only financial. It is political, cultural, memorial. Bridging this gap will take years, difficult choices, and a political will that transcends governmental alternations.

The real challenge: building a strategic culture

The most urgent investigation may not be the one about figures — GDP percentages, billions of euros, F-35 delivery schedules. It is the one about mindsets. Is Belgium, a country at the heart of Europe and historic seat of Atlantic institutions, ready to permanently integrate defense as a first-rank national priority? Are its citizens, its businesses, its universities, its industry prepared to build a strategic culture — that awareness that collective security requires a permanent contribution, not only in times of crisis?

The seven F-16s that will fly toward Ukraine in 2026 will be a consistency test. If Belgium meets its commitments on schedule — which it has not always done in the past — it will send a signal that its turning point is genuine. If it temporizes again, it will confirm that the 2% was an electoral posture rather than a strategic conviction. In this context, the investigation remains open. And history will not be patient.

Sources

Primary Sources

Ukrainska Pravda — Zelensky discusses F-16 delivery schedule with Belgian PM, including Francken's announcement of seven F-16s — June 18, 2026

NATO — Secretary General Rutte previews defense ministers' meeting: building a stronger Europe in a stronger NATO — June 17, 2026

The Brussels Times — Belgium reaches NATO target for defence spending but remains among Europe's lowest spenders — June 18, 2026

Secondary Sources

Kyiv Independent — Belgium, Germany, Sweden, Netherlands announce new military assistance for Ukraine — June 18, 2026

The Brussels Times — Belgium plans to donate its entire fleet of F-16s to Ukraine — June 18, 2026

Belga News Agency — Belgium meets NATO's 2 per cent defence spending target — March 26, 2026

Atlantic Council — NATO Defense Spending Tracker: European allies surpass expectations for 2026 — June 20, 2026

BNP Paribas Economic Research — Readiness 2030: one year on, European rearmament on track — June 17, 2026