Canada pledges to spend more on defense; US applauds move

Canada, under pressure from the United States to ramp up defense spending, on Monday pledged billions more for the armed forces and said its military expenditures would be closer to the NATO target by 2030.

In a defense policy update, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's Liberal government said protecting the Arctic, as well as dealing with security challenges from Russia and China, meant Ottawa needed to beef up its defenses.

"We are stepping up once again, to preserve and defend the rules-based order that has allowed people around the world to prosper for the better part of the last century," Trudeau said in a press conference.

Canada's military spending is set to hit 1.76% of its gross domestic product by 2030, still short of the 2% target NATO sets for member states, but up from the current 1.4%. Officials told reporters there was no target date to hit the 2% mark.

It is also unclear how much of the spending program will be put into effect, since polls show the Liberals badly trailing the official opposition Conservative Party ahead of an election that must be held by late October of 2025.

The U.S., which for years pressured Canada to boost defense spending, welcomed the update.

"The policy appears to articulate a substantial down payment toward Canada's pledge to meet its NATO commitment... we are also encouraged by the assurances we have received that there will be additional investments," David Cohen, the U.S. ambassador to Canada, said in a statement.

In February, Cohen noted other nations were doing more on defense and said "I don't think Canada has any interest in being that kind of an outlier in NATO."

Canada, which has an annual defense budget of around C$31 billion ($22.8 billion), aims to spend an extra C$8.1 billion over the next five years and a total of C$73 billion more over the next 20 years.

The world's second-largest country by territory, Canada only has 40 million people and also plays a large role in monitoring a huge Arctic territory stretching across 4.4 million square km (1.7 million square miles) of land and water.