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Executive Summary
NATO nations face three converging challenges that together require renewed European resource commitments to defense: 1) extreme Russian military aggressiveness and revanchism as displayed in Ukraine, and which if unchecked could extend beyond Ukraine, 2) rising Chinese military power and China’s ‘no limits’ partnership with Russia, and 3) the need to rapidly rebalance and redistribute NATO defense responsibilities in light of America’s growing global defense commitments.
Faced with this alarming situation, we, the undersigned members of The Alphen Group recommend adoption of a new Atlantic Charter 2025. While the Charter contains recommendations for detailed benchmarks, metrics, roadmaps, and force structure; its principal focus is to accelerate significantly Europe’s ability to execute SACEUR’s new Family of Defense Plans and reduce today’s excessive dependence on the United States. This is consistent with President-elect Trump’s notion that European defense contributions are wholly inadequate to meet current and future needs.
Implemented properly, the recommendations in this Charter would significantly strengthen European defense capabilities and reduce worldwide pressures on American forces. Global security and transatlantic solidarity would be enhanced as a result. The implicit deal would be that America’s strong commitment to NATO’s Article 5 would be sustained in return for a European defense buildup leading to a more capable and balanced Alliance.
Resourcing the recommendations contained in this Charter will be difficult given European economic problems, so the Charter endorses creation of a Defense, Security and Resilience (DSR) Bank designed to expedite and expand financing for NATO’s defense requirements going well beyond Allies’ 2024 defense investment pledge.
In addition. the Allies must commit themselves to helping Ukraine defeat Russian aggression as a critical requirement for the future of transatlantic security and preservation of the rules-based international order.
We the undersigned urge NATO leaders at the June 2025 Summit in The Hague to: 1) commit to rapidly building European and Canadian capabilities to execute SACEUR’s new Family of Defense Plans, and 2) consider creation of a new Defense, Security and Resilience Bank to help finance this effort.
The Mission
In August 1941, Prime Minister Winston Churchill and President Franklin Delano Roosevelt issued the Atlantic Charter which established a politico-military relationship which in time became the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and endures to this day. The Charter was made credible by the March 1941 Lend-Lease Act which established the United States as the Arsenal of Democracy.
and enabled the British to maintain the fight against Nazism. The Charter was built on American potential – both economic and military. Today, a new Atlantic Charter is needed built on European potential and greater European strategic responsibility within the broad framework of NATO.
Atlantic Charter 2025 builds on TAG Transatlantic Compact 2024 by looking beyond the debate over spending 2%, 3% or even 4% of GDP on defense by the European Allies. To that end, the Charter focuses on the minimum military capabilities, capacities and structures NATO will need to do the job both implicit and explicit in SACEUR’s Family of Plans adopted at the 2023 Vilnius Summit. The Charter is based on a worst-case analysis of the contingencies and assumptions with which NATO’s defense and deterrence posture could have to contend.
The Charter also constitutes a New Deal for America in NATO built on strengthened European and Canadian forces and much greater interoperability with US forces in all contingencies. If adopted and implemented by America’s NATO Allies, with the support and encouragement of the United States, it would ease growing world-wide pressure on US forces and resources through a much-strengthened NATO European Pillar that would by 2030 be able to act as a high-end, first responder force in and around the European Theater of Operations and in all circumstances. The reinforced European pillar would be balanced by a reconceived NATO North American pillar in which strengthened Canadian forces focus on high-end interoperability with their US counterparts with a particular focus on the Arctic and the North Atlantic.
What minimum military capabilities and capacities do the European Allies need to provide and by when to ensure better transatlantic burden-sharing given the growing pressures on US forces world-wide and the shared threat array? Atlantic Charter 2025 is a reconfirmation of the Alliance’s critical importance to the security of all the Allies, including the United States, guiding the way for NATO transformation. The Charter thus offers a substantive roadmap with specific capacity benchmarks and metrics that calls upon the Allies to focus on the requirements necessitated by the new Russian threat and to reinforce and accelerate implementation of the Strategic Concept and the decisions of the Madrid, Vilnius and Washington Summits, via more balanced and effective Alliance defense and deterrence. Key deliverables, benchmarks, and metrics together with recommended actions are identified.
How can European allies that struggle to realize the 2% GDP target meet a defense investment challenge that implies an even greater financial commitment? The answer is a form of reverse Lend- Lease Deal. A Defense, Security and Resilience (DSR) Bank would provide demand-side financing for Nations by offering Collective Debt Issuance. The DSR Bank concept has been championed by the Atlantic Council and has been studied by NATO’s International Staff for five years.nations and defense industries with access to the cheapest possible financing (AAA credit rating) for long term, predictable and reliable defense procurement. A DSR Bank would also offer Loan Programs. Funds raised would enable nations to purchase armaments, modernize defense systems, and invest in dual-use technologies without significantly increasing their direct public debt. This money would further complement existing defense budgets and any national contributions to the bank would support defense investment policy goals such 1 This Charter endorses the concept of a DSR Bank and urges NATO leaders to consider it at the June 2025 NATO summit. The DSR Bank would pool the creditworthiness of participating nations to raise funds in global financial markets. This collective debt would provide as defense spending targets.
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