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Comment by burkaman | Hacker News Reader

NATO is a great example. The US funded about 22% of the NATO budget last year, which seems about consistent with its size relative to the other members: http://www.nato.int/nato_static_fl2014/assets/pictures/stock...

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That's some weird set of numbers you got there. But I got a better one: http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2017/02/daily-c....

This is a graph of what members spend on their own military, not what they contribute to NATO. It's still relevant, because we have an obligation to defend other members and how well they defend themselves affects our behavior, but it's not a zero-sum game. Greece decreasing its defense budget does not mean we need to increase ours, and Poland increasing theirs doesn't mean we can decrease ours.

NATO members absolutely should spend what they agreed to spend, but we aren't forced to spend 3.6% of our budget on defense because they don't. That's something we choose to do, and we could stop if we wanted to.

NATO mandates that members of NATO spend at least 2% of their GDP on their own militaries. The vast majority of them do not, they just count on the US stepping in for free if shit hits the fan. The point of NATO is that countries keep up their militaries to the acceptable standard so as to lend a helping hand if the need arises, not that they contribute equally to the NATO's doughnuts budget.

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