U.S. presses allies to raise defense spending after Ukraine

By Adrian Croft and David Brunnstrom BRUSSELS (Reuters) - U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel urged NATO allies on Tuesday to raise their defense budgets in response to the Ukraine crisis, saying a slide in military spending could pose as much of a threat to the future of the alliance as any enemy. He also called on allies to look at how their militaries were trained, equipped and structured to meet new security challenges, saying NATO should expect Russia to continue to test its resolve, even though it was withdrawing its troops from the Ukraine border. And we must hold fast to those guarantees by summoning the will to invest in a revitalized NATO," Hagel said, according to the text of a speech to NATO defense ministers meeting in Brussels. The 28-member alliance is studying what longer-term steps it needs to take to bolster its eastern defenses and improve its ability to respond to the unorthodox tactics used by Russia during its annexation of Ukraine's Crimea region. Read More http://ift.tt/1p4uNaR