Poland and the United Kingdom announced a new defense and security treaty aimed at countering Russian aggression. British Prime Minister Kier Starmer and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk announced the treaty in May 2026. The agreement aims to support defense jobs, help the two countries respond to cyberattacks, improve border security and dismantle organized crime groups, according to a BBC report.
“There’s no greater challenge for either of our countries than the challenge of Russian aggression, and we see that not just in Ukraine itself, but beyond Ukraine, impacting on our own countries,” Starmer said, according to the BBC. “So that’s the context in which we sign what is actually a generational uplift in the relationship on security and defense between our two countries.”
The treaty’s signing comes as Poland is rapidly accelerating its defense spending. Warsaw announced a boost in military spending that will be funded by nearly $51 billion in loans from the European Union (EU). Poland was the first nation to receive loans under the Security Action for Europe program (SAFE), which the EU Council adopted in May 2025 to accelerate defense readiness by strengthening member nations’ technological and industrial base to fill capability gaps. Warsaw entered an agreement to tap into the funds in May 2026 during a signing ceremony attended by key leaders from the EU and Poland.
Poland has rapidly increased its defense spending since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
“We all hope to avoid open conflict, but we know the time and place we live in, so we want to ensure that the Polish army and the Polish defense industry will be able to meet any challenge,” Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said during the ceremony, according to the website Breaking Defense. “This is also the day when all of Europe shows that it has learned a lesson from history and that it is ready, in accordance with the recommendations and in cooperation with the United States, to take on much greater responsibility for our security.”
Under the SAFE program, the EU will provide up to $174 billion to EU nations in competitively priced, long-maturity loans to member states requesting financial assistance for investment in defense capabilities, according to the European Commission website. The program is the first pillar of the commission’s ReArm Europe Plan/Readiness 2030, which aims to unlock $930 billion in defense spending across the EU in two categories:
- Category 1 — Ammunition and missiles; artillery systems, including deep precision strike capabilities; ground combat capabilities and their support systems, including soldier equipment and infantry weapons; small drones (NATO Class 1) and related anti-drone systems; critical infrastructure protection; cyber; military mobility including counter-mobility
- Category 2 — Air and missile defense systems; maritime surface and underwater capabilities; drones other than small drones (NATO Class 2 and 3) and related anti-drone systems; strategic enablers including strategic airlift, air-to-air refueling, C4ISTAR (Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Information/Intelligence, Surveillance, Targeting Acquisition and Reconnaissance) systems as well as space assets and services; space assets protection; artificial intelligence and electronic warfare
Poland leads other NATO members in percentage of GDP spend on defense, at 4.8%. Leaders have pushed foreign defense contractors to invest in the country’s industrial base.
“We are saying clearly … if you want to be our partner, if you want to sell here, you need to invest in Poland. You need to transfer the technology. You need to build partnership — a real partnership,” Konrad Golota, undersecretary of state at Poland’s Ministry of State Assets, told defense contractors at the May 2026 Defense 24 Days conference in Warsaw, Poland, according to the website National Defense. “Poland is not going to be just an assembly line or just a wallet or just a credit card.”