Adding significant detail to the July 2018 NATO summit, a number of Trump aides both current and former have told the press that Trump repeatedly pushed the idea of withdrawing the US from NATO in the lead-up to, and during, the summit.
In the lead-up to the summit, President Trump reportedly told his top national security team that he did not see the point of the military alliance, and that he viewed it as a drain on US resources. He repeatedly complained Europe wasn’t spending enough on their militaries.
All of this is broadly in keeping with President Trump’s past stance on NATO, which centered on repeated demands that all NATO nations meet a 2% of GDP, a US-imposed goal most nations weren’t meeting. Then, in July Trump pushed the demand to all NATO nations spending 4% of their GDP on their military.
Reports at the time of the July summit saw Trump declaring himself “extremely unhappy” with the alliance, and claiming that everyone had agreed to give him whatever he wanted, though other NATO leaders contested this.
There were even multiple media reports at the time that Trump threatened to withdraw from NATO at the summit if he didn’t get his demands met. French President Emmanuel Macron claimed this was untrue, and that Trump had never directly made such a threat.
The push for NATO spending increases is hardly a Trump-exclusive one, and has been common among US presidents for decades. Trump’s willingness to question the need for NATO as an anti-Russia alliance is unusual.
NATO’s hostility toward Russia is likely why this report is coming out now, six months after the summit. Media reports have tried to claim Trump is beholden to Russian President Vladimir Putin, and the reports on the summit were peppered with quotes from Obama-era officials claiming that Trump’s position is a “gift to Putin.”
It is also likely this determination to make everything about Russia that has the White House blanketly denying the reports about what happened in July, even though they broadly just confirm everything we were already told about the environment surrounding the summit at the time.
The Deep State would kill Trump for sure before they would allow him to dismantle NATO
I believe that Trump would never actually consider pulling out of NATO, but the hearsay that he broached the subject resonates well among many diehard Trump supporters.
What makes you believe that?
Report: Trump also “pushed” the idea of cutting the bloody imperialism; withdrawing from Syria; withdrawing from Afghanistan; achieving better relations with Russia; generally pursuing peace through diplomacy; investigating 9/11; putting Hillary Clinton in jail; etc., etc., etc. Note however that just like any other demagogue, Trump doesn’t actually try to accomplish any of these things, he merely postures and pushes ideas.
In fact as I type this he’s pushing the idea of “the wall” but he doesn’t really want “the wall” or he wouldn’t have waited until the Democrats got control of the house to make an issue out of it. Just like everything else, he merely wants to posture and pretend he wants “the wall” but he also wants to blame the Democrats for doing him the favor of killing the idea.
Yes, a lot of “pushing” but not much action yet, and neocon gargoyles appointed to critical positions. But sometimes posturing has to be followed by action, lest one loses support, or one can hope?
The 64 million dollar issue is whether the European nations will then revert to independent armed forces or try to create a EAF = European Armed Force. Independent armed forces are an almost sure prescription for local wars which may spread.
In the context of a EAF a main issue is whether nuclear GB will participate even after Brexit. If GB does not participate then Germany could go nuclear.
The unintended consequences of ending NATO may be far more messy than the intended ones.
Germany could go nuclear, Dieter? Really?? Those nuclear weapons in Germany belong to the US, not to Germany. If Trump really pulled the US out of NATO, I’m sure he wouldn’t leave any nuclear weapons behind.
I wish he would pull out of NATO, it’s an anachronism that should’ve been dismantled simultaneously with the Warsaw Pact .. And, when the USSR collapsed, NATO should’ve been gone. It used to stand for North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Not anymore, Dieter, it changed into the North Atlantic Terrorist Organization, waging illegal wars of aggression worldwide.
Of course Germany will not grab the US nukes on its territory. That would be utter madness.
Werner Heisenberg who worked on nuclear weapons during WW2 did not even get a simple reactor started in a cave at the town of Haigerloch (I have visited the site). Today there are U235 enrichment plants working in Germany (company name Urenco). Their capacity needs to be significantly enlarged to produce enough bomb-grade U235 within a short time. The Germans are capable to do that. They are also capable to produce nuclear weapons. And there should be absolutely no doubt that the Germans can swiftly obtain the needed rocketry (V3, V4, a.s.o.)
If the Germans are no longer under our and the GB nuclear shield, what is left for them to ward of Russian or other nuclear blackmail? The French shield! I bet that any German government would not want to rely on that shield.
I do not predict that Germany will do this but that under sufficient pressure of the population it may do so.
I agree that from our point of view there is not much of an advantage for staying in NATO. In Europe that is very different. Even though there are not many Europeans alive today who lived through WW2, there is in all European countries a far greater knowledge and understanding of the war-filled history of Europe. There is fear that a reversal to pre 1945 will bring wars back to Europe, especially on the ever-volatile Balkan. The NATO country with the second-largest armed forces is….Turkey!
He should have pushed harder.