Welcome back to our second special edition of Foreign Policy’s Situation Report, live from Day 1 of the NATO summit in The Hague, where we are combating our jet lag with copious amounts of coffee as well as sugar from the rainbow-colored cookies called “disco biscuits” that are available for free at the summit.
World leaders, including U.S. President Donald Trump, are scheduled to arrive Tuesday evening for a “social dinner” hosted by the king and queen of the Netherlands.
Here’s what’s on tap for the day: NATO and the U.S. downplay concerns of a rift, SitRep gets a front-line perspective from Estonia, and key Indo-Pacific leaders skip the summit.
Hunky Dory
Even before he arrived at the summit, Trump’s contentious dynamic with the alliance was already the elephant in the room. But on Tuesday, as leaders braced for Trump to touch down later in the day, NATO chief Mark Rutte and U.S. Ambassador to NATO Matthew Whitaker both tried to downplay the divide.
“My message to my European colleagues is: Stop worrying so much,” Rutte said at the onset of the summit. “Stop running around being worried about the U.S. They are with us.”
As evidence of this, Rutte pointed to the fact that U.S. Lt. Gen. Alexus G. Grynkewich was recently tapped to be the next supreme allied commander Europe. “Guess what? The new supreme allied commander has been announced, and last time I checked his passport, it was the U.S.,” Rutte said.
But the NATO chief also emphasized that Trump’s commitment to NATO is contingent on alliance members spending more on defense. NATO members are set to agree on a new defense spending target of 5 percent of national GDP at the summit, though Trump said last week that the United States—currently at 3.4 percent—shouldn’t be expected to pony up more cash. “I don’t think we should, but I think they should,” he said last week.
In perhaps an effort not to rock the boat further, Rutte did not address the possibility that Washington won’t sign onto the target—even as he said there would be “no opt-outs” for other reluctant members such as Spain.
The commitment may have mollified Trump enough that NATO can get away without fireworks at the summit’s main event on Tuesday, but multiple officials told SitRep that they have learned to always expect the unexpected with the U.S. president.
‘A reliable ally.’ Whitaker was far less ambiguous and offered a full-throated backing of the alliance at the summit. “The United States isn’t going anywhere. … The United States is going to be a reliable ally,” he said onstage at the NATO Public Forum. “We’ve never been more engaged.”
But Whitaker’s comments came as much of Trump’s attention was being pulled away from NATO’s traditional concerns by the uncertainty swirling around an Israel-Iran cease-fire announced by the president on Monday. As he departed Washington for The Hague on Tuesday, Trump raged at Israel and Iran amid signs that the truce was already at risk of collapsing.
It’s also fair to wonder whether NATO members are confident in Trump’s commitment, particularly less than a year after Vice President J.D. Vance’s combative speech at the Munich Security Conference raised anxiety across Europe.
We put that question to Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur, who is here at the summit. The last time SitRep spoke to Pevkur, coincidentally, was after Vance’s speech in Munich. But Pevkur said that he thinks U.S. fidelity toward the alliance remains intact. “I believe the U.S. commitment in Munich was the same as it is today,” he said. “They are still committed to NATO; they are still committed to collective defense.”
Trump, for his part, appeared quite pleased with himself while en route to the summit. The president posted a screenshot of a text message from Rutte on Truth Social in which the NATO chief showered him with praise for making “us all safer” with his “decisive action in Iran.” Rutte also credited Trump with pushing NATO toward the 5 percent defense spending goal. “You are flying into another big success,” the NATO chief said. Whether or not this will help ward off any spicy interactions at the summit involving the U.S. president and NATO allies, as has been the case in the past, remains to be seen.
On the Button
What should be high on your radar, if it isn’t already.
The view from the Baltics. Though a direct conflict between NATO and Russia may never come, Estonia wants to ensure that it’s always prepared for that possibility—and it has fair reasons for that. The Baltic nation, which was annexed by the Soviet Union in 1940 and remained a part of it until regaining independence in 1991, shares a border with Russia and views it as a perpetual threat.
Estonia sees itself and other NATO members in close proximity to Russia’s borders as the alliance’s front door. “The only way to keep the front door closed is with the collective effort and with deterrence, to send a message to Russia that we are all together in this,” Pevkur told SitRep.
It therefore comes as no surprise that Estonia is one of the biggest cheerleaders for NATO’s new 5 percent defense spending goal—portraying the ambitious objective as long overdue. “Europe has been like a lazy, fat cat not doing anything with the defense. Even after 2014, when Russia invaded Ukraine, nothing happened. Some sanctions, but no reaction,” Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna told SitRep at the NATO summit. Tsahkna said NATO should have moved in this direction a decade ago. “But finally, we’re here,” he said.
In a sign of how seriously Tallinn is taking this, Estonia is on track to spend 5.4 percent of GDP on defense by next year—which would put it way ahead of many alliance members. Tsahkna conceded that spending so much on defense can impact other sectors of the economy but emphasized that in Estonia “there wouldn’t be any kind of social, medical, or education system if Russia is invading and we are not ready for that.” He said that the Estonian government has the “full support of the people.”
Pevkur also underscored that the cost of deterrence is far cheaper than the price tag of a war, pointing to how much Ukraine is spending amid its fight with Russia. Ukraine had the largest military burden of any country in 2024, spending 34 percent of its GDP on defense. The Estonian defense minister said he would much rather “invest 5 percent during peacetime” to help preserve peace and freedom than see Estonia land in a similar situation.
Indo-Pacific lite. NATO has stepped up its engagements in recent years with countries in China’s backyard—specifically Japan, South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand. The heads of government of each of those countries have attended the last three NATO summits dating back to 2022 in Madrid.
This year, however, only New Zealand chose to send its leader, in perhaps a sign that the truncated agenda is unlikely to leave much room for direct engagement with the alliance and particularly the United States. Japan’s foreign ministry announced abruptly on Monday that Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba would not be attending, just three days after he said he would. Japan was instead represented by Foreign Minister Takeshi Iwaya, whom Rutte met on Tuesday right after meeting New Zealand’s prime minister, Christopher Luxon.
The Japanese foreign ministry was vague about the reasons for Ishiba’s cancellation, only citing “various circumstances,” but the NATO summit’s core theme of Trump pushing allies to increase defense spending has caused tensions between Washington and Tokyo. Japan canceled its annual “2+2” security meeting with the United States scheduled for July 1, the Financial Times reported, after the Trump administration demanded it increase defense spending to 3.5 percent from the previously agreed 3 percent.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese also decided to skip the summit, after his planned meeting with Trump at the G-7 summit in Canada last week was stymied by Trump’s early departure from that gathering. Albanese’s deputy, Richard Marles, came in his stead.
South Korean President Lee Jae-myung also dropped out of the summit, with his spokesperson citing “a confluence of urgent domestic issues and growing instability in the Middle East,” according to local media. A NATO spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment on the three leaders’ absence.
Snapshot
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen (left), Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky (center), and NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte (right) react during a meeting of NATO defense ministers in The Hague on June 24. Jonas Roosens/ANP/AFP via Getty Images
Put on Your Radar
Wednesday’s NATO summit agenda, in Central European Time (GMT+1):
9:55 a.m.: Rutte and Trump address the summit.
10:30 a.m.: Meeting of all the heads of state and government attending the summit as part of the North Atlantic Council.
2 p.m.: Rutte holds a press conference.
2.30 p.m.: Rutte meets with NATO’s Indo-Pacific partners.
3.30 p.m.: Rutte and Zelensky meet with the leaders of the E-5 countries (France, Germany, Italy, Poland, and the United Kingdom).
Quote of the Day
“We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don’t know what the fuck they’re doing.”
—Trump responding to the news that an Iran-Israel cease-fire was on shaky ground, less than a day after he announced the truce, as he left the White House for The Hague early on Tuesday.