“Si vis pacem para bellum”, argued (quoting an ancient Latin adage) the President of the Council of Ministers Giorgia Meloni during the session in the Senate in view of the European Council of 26 and 27 June, to justify the so-called principle of deterrence or dissuasion.

In other words, the appeal would like to motivate the planning of a military apparatus comparable in all respects to that of an ideal current adversary, as a regulatory system for balancing powers and moderating conflicts. However, there is also another, perhaps less known, Latin saying, referring to Tacitus, which says: “desertum fecerunt et pacem appellaverunt” or, “they created a desert and called it peace”. In short, to mean that for everything there is a flip side to the coin.

It would seem to be a question of points of view, of government strategies, which should be followed, however, by reasoning concerning the limits and counter-limits of each specific choice which, in this case, could translate into pure and simple questions of sustainability. Nor would it be correct to consider the approval for one or the other position simply in terms of alignments, of the position of the government majority or of the opposition. The different positions on the question could also be transversal.

On June 25, the NATO countries, thirty-two in all, including Italy, met in The Hague in the Netherlands. No question. If only, since Donald Trump insisted that those same member countries contribute a negligible amount (so to speak) to military spending compared to the United States, then, consequently, they should find a way to allocate 5% of their Gross Domestic Product to military spending. Said and done, the agreement was found. The only solo voice, the Spanish Prime Minister, Pedro Sanchez, who, standing out (some might argue) for his determination and his inclination towards realpolitik, with his own demonstration of dissent, was able to obtain a waiver for Spain. An important result both from an economic point of view and, above all, from a political point of view (Pedro Sanchez pronounced his “no” to Donald Trump) and which, however, despite a context characterized by a particularly difficult economic situation, seems to have attracted the displeasure of the other countries of the Alliance.

Just to clarify, the destination, in the unprecedented percentage of the Gross Domestic Product, should be divided between defense spending in the strict sense, i.e. armaments and personnel (3.5%), and security spending, i.e. infrastructure, including civilian ones such as ports and railways (1.5%). And certainly, there does not seem to exist, at the moment, a starting situation, so to speak, of balance between the different NATO countries, in the sense that for some, the increase may not have a decisive impact, to support the same already rather high defense spending (Eastern European countries for example). As far as Italy is concerned, as noted by many, the national budget is already heavily burdened by a significant public debt and, the new economic commitment will translate, with good likelihood, into cuts in public spending in key sectors such as health and social policies. Perhaps, what Donald Trump, after the summit in The Hague, calls a victory, may not be so for all the allies.

The very premise of the determination that underlies the decision taken at the NATO summit would appear fallacious and illusory: that a "simple" (so to speak) increase in military spending could be considered sufficient to have a decisive impact on the new geopolitical balances of the planet.

Giuseppina Di Salvatore – Lawyer, Nuoro

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