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Shkruar nga Pamfleti
Europe is playing the game, at least for now...
President Donald Trump has reshaped a generations-old transatlantic alliance, built on shared democratic values, into a framework that could easily be called a business.
He has persuaded NATO members to increase their defense spending and invest heavily in American weapons for Ukraine. This week, at the annual meeting of alliance leaders, the US president will once again turn the focus to how much Europeans can spend on American military equipment.
The shift, which reflects the administration’s increasingly transactional approach to some of America’s closest allies, risks fueling discussions about how to expand membership or defend NATO’s eastern flank against Russia. And it has strained the bonds that once held the group together, transforming the alliance into one shaped more by national interest than shared ideals.
"Europe is still dependent on the US for some time. So it is not in our interest to incite strife. But we also need to make the US understand in firm ways that Europe should not be [taken] for granted, that we have our own interests too ," said a European diplomat.
Matt Whitaker, the US ambassador to NATO, emphasized the economic aspect of this year's summit, which will take place in Ankara, Turkey, on July 7 and 8.
"Washington welcomes European efforts to increase defense production and reduce regulations. But we certainly do not support the protectionist language that has often been included in many European defense initiatives. This is an area that could be raised during the summit and on which we expect to reach an agreement," he told reporters a few days before the forum.
Whitaker praised allies for committing nearly $120 billion in defense spending over the past year, with half of it on American-made equipment, and called it a "good start."
This investment is significantly higher than last year’s summit, where allies gathered to pledge an additional $90 billion. It comes after Trump demanded that allies increase their defense spending from 2 percent of GDP to 5 percent or risk losing U.S. support. The president has repeatedly threatened to leave the alliance if countries fail to keep their promises. And Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has linked higher defense spending to faster U.S. arms sales to allies.
This business-first stance has, to some extent, permeated each of Trump’s six annual summits during his two terms. But it has become increasingly apparent as the president talks about seizing Greenland, wavers on U.S. support for Ukraine, and imposes harsh tariffs on NATO members. This approach is also supported by Trump’s playbook of demanding that the world buy American goods, without many reciprocal trade agreements.
Europe is playing the game, at least for now. NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, during a visit to Washington last month, said that European investment supports 110,000 American jobs through $300 billion in American arms orders. And the United Kingdom and Germany, days before the summit, announced plans to produce American weapons in their countries under license.
“ The secretary-general wants to turn the summit into a deal-making event where companies announce collaborations. If Trump sees the defense industry event as positive, then he might also see the Ankara summit and, hopefully, NATO as positive ,” said a second European diplomat, who, like the others, did not want to be identified to discuss a sensitive topic.
European officials acknowledge they won't be able to come up with anything as dramatic in Ankara as they did at last year's summit in The Hague. But they point to plans to announce deals worth billions of dollars, along with a defense industry forum to be held in parallel with the summit.
" We want to get in there, make our promises on spending and security and get out before something goes wrong. We have to do this for our own security, but also, obviously, there's another element to this ," said a third European diplomat.
The White House and the Pentagon did not respond to a request for comment. But Trump on Thursday criticized countries such as Germany for failing to meet their financial obligations.
" The United States spends more money on NATO than any other country, by far, to defend them, without getting any benefit from it ," he wrote on social media.
NATO members have felt particularly hardened in recent months, after Trump surprised NATO allies with announcements to withdraw troops from Germany and cancel deployments to Poland. Europe also remains uneasy over the war in Ukraine and Russia’s approach to NATO’s eastern edge. Leaders are grappling with how the continent will defend itself from an America that is less interested in sacrificing blood and treasure on the continent. The Pentagon is expected to cancel a plan to send Tomahawk missiles to Germany, in part because officials are concerned that Russia would see it as an escalation, leaving Berlin with few answers to its urgent need for long-range weapons.
The Defense Department this year also moved two offices that have traditionally handled foreign military sales under its Acquisition and Maintenance Department. The move is part of a broader reorganization aimed at boosting defense exports and encouraging countries to buy American equipment.
The administration has made its desire to reshape the alliance even clearer in recent weeks. Hegseth addressed NATO defense ministers in Brussels last month, criticizing Europe’s political culture and warning officials that the United States was reconsidering its military influence on the continent. He also said the Pentagon has launched a review of troops stationed there.
NATO is little more than a “paper tiger” that maintains an “unhealthy dependence” on American forces, the Pentagon chief said. He complained that allies did not help the US in the Iran war, even though they were neither informed in advance of this nor asked for help until Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz, through which about 20 percent of the world’s oil passes.
" The alliance must turn into a real hardline military alliance. An alliance that has real military capabilities capable of deterring right here on the continent and taking the lead in Europe's conventional defense ," he said./ Adapted from "Pamfleti" by "Politico"
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