Great Article About Meloni
This article is the second in a series exploring Giorgia Meloni’s influence on Italy, Europe and the rest of the world
Greeted with a smart salute, Giorgia Meloni posed for pictures with a squad of elite paratroopers in front of a camouflaged Puma armoured fighting vehicle – but this was no tour of the front line of some perilous war zone.
Instead, Italy’s prime minister was inspecting an operation targeting muggers, drug dealers and petty criminals outside Rome’s biggest railway station and the Colosseum, the ancient Roman amphitheatre which has seen its fair share of combat over the centuries.
The Italian army may be able to put on a muscular show of strength on the cobbled streets of its capital, but when it comes to fighting an actual war, the long-underfunded force faces systemic challenges at a time when Europe needs to bolster its defence.
“There is a blunt northern European model, where you stand up and argue we need to be ready for war and our kids need to be ready for war now,” one senior Nato source told The Telegraph. “In southern Europe, it’s a little more subtle and a little slower.”
As the Continent grapples with how to respond to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the prospect of the US shifting its defensive posture towards the Americas and the Pacific, Guido Crosetto, Italy’s defence minister, has warned that the country cannot defend itself.
“We are not ready for a Russian attack or an attack by any other nation. I have been saying this for a long time,” he said. “Twenty years cannot be recovered in a year or two.”
Italy’s military is one of the best in Europe on paper. But the operational availability of its military equipment barely reaches 30 per cent, and its troops face a lack of training because of a dwindling budget.
Ms Meloni’s close ally Donald Trump, the US president, also expects big increases in Nato defence spending – something that Italy, hampered by significant debts and tight public budgets, can ill afford.
The prime minister, once feared as a hard-Right Eurosceptic, has earned a reputation as a pragmatic stateswoman abroad, which she combines with populism aimed at her core supporters at home.
She gained entry to the top table of European leaders thanks to her support of Ukraine. Several European sources said it made her an acceptable partner, unlike other nationalists such as her friend Viktor Orban of Hungary.
She has won plaudits for her efforts to balance the books in the Eurozone’s third-largest economy.
But she still faces Mr Trump’s demands for Nato members to increase their defence spending.
Rome’s hands are tied amid forecasts that its public debt mountain will reach 137.7 per cent of GDP by 2035.
S&P Global Ratings, the credit rating agency, has said the deficit could surge to 148.4 per cent should Ms Meloni attempt to borrow her way to Nato defence spending targets.
Greece’s debt-to-GDP ratio at the height of the Eurozone financial crisis was around 160 per cent. Italy’s economy is much bigger and so poses a greater risk if there is a financial shock.
The US president also wants European forces to police a future peace deal in Ukraine.
In contrast to her allies in the Coalition of the Willing, such as Britain and France, Ms Meloni has categorically ruled out Italian boots on the ground, calling the plan “risky and ineffective”.
A dizzying balancing act
Since taking her Brothers of Italy party from the fringes to the mainstream, Ms Meloni has brought a rare stability to Italian politics.
If that is to continue, she must consider her pro-Russian coalition partner, Matteo Salvini.
The League party leader has described EU plans to boost defence spending as “warmongering” and has said Italy should stop sending weapons to Kyiv.
Infamous for wearing T-shirts emblazoned with Vladimir Putin’s face, he insists Ukraine is losing the war and should accept Russian peace terms.
Ms Meloni’s political balancing act between the US, Europe and her coalition is made even more dizzying by Italian public opinion.
Only 15 per cent of Italians believe the EU and US should continue to arm Ukraine until Russian forces are driven out, according to the Institute for the Study of International Politics.
Some 36 per cent of Italians want the war to end as soon as possible, regardless of the consequences for Ukraine, even if it means significant territorial losses.
Meanwhile 13 per cent think that the EU and US must stop supplying arms even if this would allow Russia to conquer Ukraine.
“There is a certain irony about asking Italy to spend more on defence,” another senior Nato official told The Telegraph, referring to public opposition to divert funds away from healthcare and welfare.
Law and order is also a concern.
Paolo Balotta, 51, who was born and raised in Ms Meloni’s home suburb of Garbatella in Rome, said: “We have taken in too many migrants. Railway stations in big cities like Rome and Milan are dangerous – there are drug dealers, robbers, muggers.”
Ms Meloni’s toughness on crime and illegal immigration has earned her comparisons to Margaret Thatcher. But this Iron Lady’s Achilles heel may prove to be defence.
Francesco Galietti, the founder of think tank Policy Sonar, said: “Italy can only spend so much; it has no fiscal headroom. Often, what they decide to sacrifice when it comes to budgets is defence.”
Italy had the biggest Communist Party in the Western world during the Cold War, and there remains an admiration for Russia amongst some Italians, he said.
“You have to remember that the Vatican has an enduring, beneath-the-surface influence on Italian political elites,” said Mr Galietti of a streak of pacifism that emanates from the Catholic Church.
He added: “Geography is also key. Look at where we are on the map. We are a long way from Ukraine and Russia.”
London is only about 60 miles further away from Kyiv than Rome, but that is not the perception.
An Italian nationalist with an eye on Washington
Many European nationalists openly admired Putin before his invasion became a wake-up call on a continent that had neglected defence in the aftermath of the Cold War.
In 2018, Ms Meloni said that his election win in a tightly controlled vote was “the unequivocal will of the Russian people”. But she is also a transatlanticist.
“I think she did see Ukraine as a nationalist struggle against the invader,” Nathalie Tocci, the director of Italy’s Institute for International Affairs and a former special adviser to two EU foreign affairs chiefs, told The Telegraph.
“But she is an Italian nationalist, and what happens to Ukraine is neither here nor there for her. What does matter to an Italian nationalist is having good relations with Washington.”
Ms Meloni’s support for Kyiv placed her in the mainstream of European leaders and by the side of Joe Biden, the then US president.
Mr Trump is far more conciliatory with the Russian despot and far more unpredictable, even if Ms Meloni has been called a “Trump whisperer” for her close relations with the president.
Ms Tocci said: “She wants to remain in Trump’s good favour. Now that Trump has sided with Russia, she can’t quite side with Russia, but she doesn’t want to be out there at the forefront [of the Coalition of the Willing].”
Hard power or paper tiger?
Italy fields one of Europe’s premier armed forces, with troops on Nato’s eastern flank in Estonia and Bulgaria.
By flying the F-35, the world’s only long-range, stealth fighter jet, Rome can claim a spot among the world’s leading air forces.
It was Italian F-35s that were scrambled to intercept a Russian MiG-31 aircraft, capable of carrying nuclear weapons, as it violated Estonian airspace in September last year.
Its navy, armed with an aircraft carrier, multiple modern destroyers and attack submarines, maintains a leading presence in the Mediterranean.
At any one time, Italy can have around 9,000 troops deployed on missions overseas, which observers insist is a testament to Rome’s commitment to Nato and wider international security.
Modernisation plans were accelerated after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, with a focus on technologically superior platforms and high-end capabilities.
Chief among them is the development of the Tempest, a sixth-generation fighter jet, alongside Britain and Japan.
There are other major investment initiatives, including the A2CS programme to overhaul the country’s armoured forces.
Italy has always attempted to offset complaints about low military spending and a lack of manpower by demonstrating its willingness to deploy overseas on Nato and EU military missions.
These contributions, often described as a “golden ticket” by analysts, have allowed Rome to argue that it sufficiently contributes to European security while not hitting capability and expenditure targets.
But there are significant vulnerabilities in Italy’s military.
As much as 60 per cent of military spending has gone on staff expenses, including pensions. Italy has an ageing population, and the average age in the army is 38. In the air force, it is 41.
Just 11 per cent of spending has been directed towards operations and maintenance.
Meanwhile, only 50 of Italy’s 200 Arietes, its domestically made battle tanks, are operational. Rome needs as many as 250 tanks to meet Nato’s requirements.
“If you don’t have resources for maintenance and sustainment for what you already have in terms of equipment, you will face problems in terms of readiness, which is pretty critical,” said Federico Borsari, of the Centre for European Policy Analysis.
The lack of budget for military readiness also means many of Italy’s sizeable number of servicemen do not receive sufficient training to keep them sharp.
“Readiness is a major, major problem,” Mr Borsari added.
Despite fielding some of the most advanced weaponry, Italy lacks manpower.
It fields a much smaller navy – around 29,000 sailors – than Britain and France. Turkey could soon overtake it as the largest naval presence in the Mediterranean, in what would be a blow to Italian pride.
Some 9,000 more staff need to be recruited to man all of the warships and submarines in Italy’s existing fleet.
Its army is also looking to recruit some 40,000 more soldiers, expanding the country’s armed forces to around 135,000 men.
Italy hopes to recruit some 10,000 of these by creating a new volunteer reserve force, which, unlike its defunct predecessor, does not include conscription.
Spending pressure
Italy’s economy was buoyed by €194.4bn (£168.7bn) in EU Covid recovery funds, which will end this year. It is only expected to grow by 0.7 per cent of GDP this year.
As a share of GDP, Rome’s defence spending between 2014 and 2024 was among the lowest in the alliance.
The country only spent 1.49 per cent of GDP on defence in 2024, the third-lowest share among major Nato economies behind Spain and Canada.
Prompted by Mr Trump’s return to the White House, Ms Meloni agreed to hit the 2 per cent target early, reaching the goal in 2025 rather than 2028.
Under more US pressure, last year Nato members agreed to increase defence spending to 5 per cent of GDP. They also agreed to lift spending on core defence to 3.5 per cent of GDP and 1.5 per cent on strategic infrastructure.
Last year, Italy pushed to water down the numbers spent on defence in talks before Nato’s annual leadership summit in The Hague.
Italian envoys argued that the balance should be 3 per cent and 2 per cent – because it would help them achieve the target through already planned infrastructure projects, such as a plan to build the world’s longest suspension bridge from the mainland to Sicily.
Raising spending is a major challenge for debt-laden Italy, which was placed in special measures by the European Union for breaching the bloc’s fiscal rules in 2024.
The plan is to exit the “excessive deficit procedure” by bringing its deficit below 3 per cent of GDP by the middle of 2026.
When that is complete, Italy is expected to activate a new “escape clause” introduced by the European Commission, which excludes defence spending from deficit rules for four years.
Ms Meloni wants to harness EU efforts to ramp up defence manufacturing in Europe to the benefit of Leonardo, the national-champion defence firm. Italy will receive €14.9bn (£12.7bn) in EU loans to strengthen its defence industry.
In November, her government said that defence spending would increase by up to 0.2 per cent of GDP annually until 2035, the deadline for the latest Nato targets.
In 2025, Italy presented a national defence budget of €31bn (£26.4bn), a 7.2 per cent increase on the figure from the previous year.
To increase that to the €45bn (£38bn) required to hit Nato’s 2 per cent target, a host of government outlay was reclassified as defence spending.
It covered the Carabinieri, the paramilitary police force, and pension payments to former members of the armed forces.
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There are also suggestions that Rome moved a series of infrastructure projects, such as bridges, ports, roads and railways, into the spending basket under the guise of military mobility, in order to reach the goal.
But this will not be revealed until Nato allies are allowed to pore over each other’s spending plans.
Nato insiders suggest this might not happen too quickly, so as not to risk the anger of Mr Trump when he finds out how many nations have cooked the books to increase spending.