NATO Public Forum YouTube Studio 2024 | 🇳🇱 Ruben Brekelmans with Marvin Neumann & Sam Ellis

Hello. Back again to the NATO public forum. My name is Marvin, and we're here. Not alone. Actually, I've got two guests. One guests from the Netherlands. And also Sam. Hi, there. Happy to be here. So, we have a guest, Reuben Brekelmans, Ruben Brekelmans If I pronounce it is my german voice, I think that one would have been perfect. you're a politician from the Netherlands. Please for everybody who doesn't know you introduce yourself. And that's not strange, because I've just been the minister of defense, for one week. but before that, I was a member of parliament in the Netherlands. mostly focusing on foreign affairs and on the side of immigration. but now I'm a minister of defense. So, focusing even more on defense policy. Of course, in our international security. I'm interested in, I think, to a lot of audiences, particularly younger audiences. a summit like this is a bit of a mystery to them. Can you explain how does something like this work for you, and did you have any particular priorities coming into this summit? Sure. Yeah. So you have some big plenary sessions where all the, member states are there. So you have 32 leaders in the room. having these these big discussions. but besides, there are also many side events, and there are also bilateral meetings. so for me, because I'm very new, it was an opportunity for me to get to know all my colleagues and also to show everyone, or to convey a clear message, so that our Dutch foreign policy remain the same. we now have a different coalition than we had in the past. but regarding defense, regarding foreign policy, regarding our support of Ukraine, our position will be very similar. and it was also a good opportunity to discuss those topics. So support to Ukraine, our contribution to NATO and also our broader international position. Here in the US, we have a big presidential election coming this fall. I'm curious, from your perspective, is NATO doing enough to prepare for the chance that the US reduces its involvement in NATO, or pulls out entirely? I think the commitment that, was made to the commitments that were made here are very good in this summit. but to be perfectly honest, European countries should do more. so we are now on an upward trajectory when it comes to investments in defense. but still, it is not enough. especially our industrial production should scale up. we should also speed up because many plans are made, but it's taking many, many years in order to really increase our production. and Ukraine need your support now. we need to also strengthen our defense and our deterrence now. so I think we should also sometimes be, a little bit, maybe less, liberal, in the sense that, you know, if you leave it up to open markets and leave it up to investors and companies, then of course, it takes time to do those investments. And maybe sometimes governments should pay, should play a bigger role in this, because it's also a matter of making progress very soon. as I said, because our, our defense is very much under pressure, which is interesting what you said now that you should, you know, not let the market do what the market does because your coalition is rather right, is rather open market. How do you convince your partners to think the same way? so I, I'm from a liberal party. I'm an economist by training. so I've always been very much in favor of open markets. It's what benefited the Netherlands in the past. so I still believe in that. I think there are many ways in which, open markets, open economies, insights entrepreneurship creates, encourage creativity. So that's all good. but when it comes to, security, and we need to also maybe do things that are maybe not providing the most return from an economic perspective, but which are needed for our security. I think governments have a bigger role to play. we also see that in order to speed up and scale up. there are many obstacles. we have shortage of materials. there are also shortages in terms of personnel, of of of people working on the technologies that we need. so in that case, also, governments might need to play a bigger role to get those obstacles away and make sure that we make progress, sooner than we are doing now. I'm curious if you discussed the idea of adding Ukraine to NATO this summit, is that something that you think should happen? That has been a big topic of discussion. I think it was good that a compromise has been found already before the summit. so in the declaration of the summit, there will be some very clear language on this saying that, the path to NATO membership for Ukraine is irreversible. and I think that's also sends a strong signal to Ukraine that the future is within NATO. And I think it was good that we found that solution. that solution was found before the summit. so it also, you know, we can show that there is unity on this topic that we, although there are some different opinions among 20, 32 countries at it, we are able to find compromises, because Russia is looking to divide us. they are looking to divide us when it comes to military support, but also on issues like this. and we should, you know, we should be united and we should not, Russia make it. Russia divide us. and I think we succeeded, in the summit with this. Which obstacles though on the way like of Ukraine joining NATO and how long do you think the process might be? Might take? of course, the big obstacle is that Ukraine is at war, and we want to prevent a direct confrontation between NATO and and Russia. and if Ukraine would join today, then there would be a direct, war between NATO and Russia. so I think that that's the major issue. I think if we want to make, steps towards, Ukrainian membership, we need to define, you know, how can those steps, look like. And, there are different ways to do that. I think the security agreements that were made between, I think, 17 countries or something and, and Ukraine so far, I think are a good step. I think if you look at how we support the Ukrainian military, not only by providing weapons, but also by helping them to modernize their military and make them compatible with NATO standards. I think those are also important steps. I also, you know, today NATO announced that they will play a much more and much stronger role in supporting Ukraine. So, over the last couple of years was more bilateral support. Now, NATO is also playing more of a coordinating role. I think that's also for NATO. That's a big step. so all these steps that we are making, will, like, build a bridge, towards, NATO membership for Ukraine. we are not there yet. but we are making significant steps, and I think that's, that's positive for Ukraine and it's positive for NATO procurements. Thank you so much for being here. And thank you so much for giving us your answers to our questions. Thank you so much for having me. It's great to be here. Thanks. And if you want to see more videos from us, during the NATO public forum, just click on other videos and we'll be there. Thanks.