SECRETARY GENERAL RUTTE: So good morning again, and good morning again, Marco, Marco Rubio. Really appreciate you being here today. We had a first discussion. We will now continue with, of course, the NATO foreign ministers, and the meeting will very much concentrate on a couple of issues also on your mind and the President's mind, which has to do with the defense spending. The good news is the money is now coming in. Defense spending is rapidly ramping up, building on the success of The Hague Summit - tens of billions, and over the years there's hundreds of billions coming in.
That also leads us to the question how to spend it to make sure that it is spent well, and that brings us to the big issue of the defense industrial base, which is not producing enough. This is a problem in Europe, this is a problem in the U.S., this will be a big issue at the Ankara Summit. But there are huge opportunities here. We have to produce more to maintain our deterrence and defense, but we're also big in terms of the defense dividend - societal effects here in terms of jobs, new factories opening up, new production lines across the Atlantic, and even more fostering the transatlantic bond.
And, of course, Ukraine will be on the agenda today, making sure that Ukraine stays strong in the fight. And I again want to thank the United States for the fact that the critical flow of U.S. military support to Ukraine in terms of, for example, the interceptors for Patriot systems continues to go, paid for by European and Canadian Allies, and it is really vital for Ukraine to stay strong in the fight.
Obvious today we have foreign ministers here, so we will discuss foreign issues, and one of the big issues now of course is Iran, the Strait of Hormuz, the issue of freedom of navigation. And I hear from many of my colleagues here that it's not acceptable that freedom of navigation is basically trampled upon as it is at the moment. And we have to think how we collectively can deal with this. And I think everybody acknowledges that the United States degrading the nuclear capability of Iran but also the long-range missile capability of Iran, is crucial for the Middle East, for Europe, for the whole world.
So again, Marco, thank you for being here, for your incredible leadership, and being such a strong supporter of our transatlantic bond.
SECRETARY RUBIO: Well, thank you. First of all, thank you to this great country for hosting us. They've been phenomenal hosts. They've been great new members of NATO, really model Allies and great hosts, so it's a pleasure to be here. It's always great to see you, Mark, and obviously we're here to set the groundwork for what I think will be probably one of the more important leaders' summit in the history of NATO. The President's views - frankly, disappointment - at some of our NATO Allies and their response to our operations in the Middle East, they are well documented. That will have to be addressed. That won't be solved or addressed today. That's something for the leaders level to discuss.
In the meantime, there are other areas where we continue with cooperation. You saw the President's announcement last night with regards to Poland and deployment. That said, obviously the United States continues to have global commitments that it needs to meet in terms of our force deployment, and that constantly requires us to re-examine where we put troops. This is not a punitive thing. It's just a - something that's ongoing, and it was pre-existing, all these recent reports and tensions and so forth.
So that's a process that will continue that I think in a very positive and productive way in collaboration with our Allies can reach decisions. But in the end, like any alliance, it has to be good for everyone who's involved. It has to be a clear understanding of where the expectations are, and so certainly we'll try to lay the groundwork for that.
One of the areas where I think we definitely can cooperate on is the defense industrial base. It is clear to the world, to all of us in the Alliance and beyond, that we simply are not able to produce munitions today at a rate that are necessary for future needs. That's something that has to be addressed. That's something that we can work together on. That's something we want to work together on. I think it's key not just to production but to interoperability, and so I imagine that'll be a topic of conversation.
On the issue of Iran, the news this morning - I know it's early on the - still in the United States, a little later in the region, in the Middle East - but we await word on those conversations that are ongoing. There's been some slight progress. I don't want to exaggerate it, but there's been a little bit of movement, and that's good. The fundamentals remain the same: Iran can never have a nuclear weapon. It just cannot. They - not on - this regime can never have nuclear weapons, and to achieve that, we're going to have to address the issue of enrichment. We're going to have to address the issue of the highly enriched uranium.
And then added to this, of course, is the issue of the straits. Iran is trying to create a tolling system. They're trying to convince Oman, by the way, to join them in this tolling system in an international waterway. There is not a country in the world that should accept that. I don't know of a country in the world that's in favor of it except Iran, but there's no country in the world that should accept it.
Right now at the United Nations we have a resolution that is sponsored by Bahrain. We've been very involved with it. It has the highest number of co-sponsors of any resolution ever before the Security Council. Unfortunately, a couple of countries on the Security Council are thinking about vetoing it. That would be lamentable. We are doing everything we can, though, to achieve the sort of global consensus that's necessary to prevent this from happening, and we're trying to use the United Nations. Let's see if the United Nations still works. That's a place that we're going to try to get an outcome for, and obviously I think almost every country represented here today has signed on as a co-sponsor of that resolution. And if they haven't, I'm sure they soon will, because I don't know of anyone in the world that would - that should be in favor of a tolling system in an international waterway.
That's just not acceptable. It can't happen. If that were to happen in the Strait of Hormuz, it will happen in five other places around the world. Why would countries all over the world say, well, we want to do this too, not to mention how vital and critical that strait is to every country represented here today, but frankly to countries not represented here today, particularly the Indo-Pacific.
So we'll have a good meeting today. I hope it'll be productive. I expect it will be and it'll set the groundwork for the leaders to meet in about six weeks, and we have a lot of work to do between now and then. Okay, thank you.
