Defense

Slovenia still faces the challenge of meeting its defense spending commitments, as it currently allocates 2.04% of GDP to defense—which is more than the previous target of 2% of GDP, but significantly less than the new target of 3.5% of GDP for direct military spending. In addition, the 1.5% of GDP target for broader resilience must also be taken into account.

With approximately 7,300 active-duty personnel, most of whom serve in land forces and a smaller naval component, our military is relatively small. To ensure an effective defense capability, it is crucial that we establish a well-organized, trained, and modernly equipped military.

Nevertheless, there are limitations to what we can achieve as a single country. In light of the current geopolitical reality, cooperation with European and NATO allies is essential for shaping a common defense strategy. Operational interoperability must be the central goal of Slovenia’s efforts, as strengthening European defense places us in a position where we can become an integral part of the common European defense structure.

Volt Slovenia advocates for Slovenia to focus on greater cooperation in the formation of a European army and on increasing defense investments to ensure greater security and resilience for the country and the European Union.

Volt Slovenija proposes:

Investments

• Slovenia must increase its military spending to 5%—3.5% for direct defense investments and 1.5% for investments in resilience—with the focus not solely on direct defense investments but also on strategic infrastructure improvements. The development of the railway network would have a dual benefit—it would enable greater mobility of military units while also contributing to the modernization and expansion of the national transport network, which would benefit both the civilian and military sectors.

Procurement

• Seek at least one additional EU member state to launch an initiative for joint procurement across all domains for both cost savings and to allow Slovenian defence companies to meet the conditions for benefiting from funding available in the EDF (European Defence Fund - requires joint procurement from at least two EU member states for development actions).

• Participation in and drawing of funds from the SAFE Mechanism.

• Commit to purchasing NATO standard equipment from Slovenian and European suppliers to ensure our Defence budget benefits the national and European defence sector. For all other sourced equipment, introduce a condition that Slovenian companies have to be put in a position to independently provide service, maintenance and spare parts.

Specialisation

• Identify a specific terrain (e.g. alpine) and types of offensive (eg drones) and defensive (eg ground-to-air defence) warfare which are suitable for Slovenia and our existing military industrial base. Try to develop European leadership in these chosen domains through specialised training and programmes as well as dedicated R&D initiatives. We should know everything, but be specialists in some disciplines.

Cooperation

• Set a path to fully integrate Slovenian military into the future EU Rapid Deployment Capacity (RDC) that is set to replace EU Battlegroups. European defence should see 27 independent militaries converge into a joint military force. We should prepare and invest in Slovenia’s role within such a joint European defence instead of maintaining duplicate and possibly redundant structures.

• Ensure that our military forces integrate with NATO and EU defence programmes and that our troops actively participate in joint training initiatives abroad to begin to adapt to multinational and multi-stakeholder environments.

(04-2026)