Trans-Atlantic anxiety about Donald Trump’s willingness to defend NATO allies from Russia stems from a misunderstanding of his “negotiating tactic” about defense spending, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee has signaled.
“I’m negotiating because I want them to pay,” Trump told Time magazine in an interview published this week. “I want Europe to pay. I want nothing bad to happen to Europe, I love Europe, I love the people of Europe, I have a great relationship with Europe. But they’ve taken advantage of us, both on NATO and on Ukraine.”
Trump’s attitude toward NATO has troubled European allies since his first presidential campaign, but those misgivings turned to alarm in February, when he suggested he “would encourage [Russia] to do whatever the hell they want” to NATO allies he deems “delinquent” on defense spending. Yet the Republican standard-bearer walked back that threat with his latest comments, which offer an unusually overt statement warning against taking such rhetoric at face value.
“That was said as a point of negotiation,” Trump said. “I said, ‘Look, if you’re not going to pay, then you’re on your own.’ And when I say things like that, that’s said as a point of negotiation, and I did a very good job because billions of dollars came in recently.”
Trump’s intentions toward the allies remain a central preoccupation for trans-Atlantic officials, one sure to persist as the presidential campaign unfolds. NATO leaders will mark the 75th anniversary of the alliance at a summit in Washington this summer, just weeks before the Republican and Democratic national conventions that mark the formal launch of the general election contest.
“People are making a lot of assumptions,” former U.S. Ambassador to NATO Kurt Volker told the Washington Examiner in a recent interview. “Trump has actually not said very much other than he wants countries to pay their share. You may have noticed his staged question with Nigel Farage, [who asked him], ‘Would you come to the defense of countries if they had paid their share?’ And he said, ‘Absolutely, 100%.’ So he’s trying to just send the message that NATO has to pull its share. That’s the main thing — not that he’s not going to defend NATO countries.”
President Joe Biden’s administration and NATO officials, for their part, have been at pains to tout the surge in the number of allies who are meeting the long-standing and oft-neglected pledge to spend at least 2% of their gross domestic product on defense.
“We’re going to be at the point where we can celebrate two-thirds of the allies meeting the 2% pledge,” Ambassador Julianne Smith, who leads the U.S. diplomatic mission to NATO, told the Atlantic Council on Monday. “Now that leaves a handful of allies that are not yet there, but I will say, those allies have plans in place to get to the 2% in two [or] three years.”
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has spurred some capitals to press for a major increase even to that threshold, a top European Union official acknowledged this week.
“When the NATO allies are increasing their budget to at least 2% of GDP, some people speak about 3% already,” Timo Pesonen, European Commission director general for defense industry, told an audience in Brussels.
Their concern is heightened by the geopolitical context, especially the war in Ukraine, and an expectation that Trump would try to end the war on terms unfavorable to Ukraine. That suspicion was amplified by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who claimed after meeting with Trump that the Republican standard-bearer would end U.S. support for Ukraine.
“I’m going to try and help Ukraine, but Europe has to get there also and do their job,” Trump said, before disputing Orban’s account of their meeting. “No, I said I wouldn’t give unless Europe starts equalizing. They have to come. Europe has to pay. We are in for so much more than the European nations. It’s very unfair to us. And I said if Europe … who are gravely more affected than we are … is not going to pay, why should we pay?”
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European countries have allocated almost 90 billion euros worth of aid to Ukraine, according to the Germany-based Kiel Institute for the World Economy, but the United States is the preeminent supplier of military equipment. Trump, in any case, credited his threats with spurring NATO allies to increase their own defense spending.
“I said it’s not fair,” he said. “And the man stood up and said, ‘Are you saying that if we aren’t paying our bills, if we don’t pay our bills, and Russia attacks us, are you saying that you will not protect us?’ I said that’s exactly what I’m saying. Now, after I said that, billions of dollars poured in.”