U.S. President Donald Trump is touting his influence over the NATO military alliance, which he said “calls me daddy” in an interview that focused partially on his vision for Europe.
The interview with Politico was released Tuesday, days after the Trump administration released a brand new national security strategy that sharply criticized European allies and said America’s goal “must be to assist Europe correct its current trajectory.”
Yet Trump insisted within the interview he has no desire to become involved in European politics.
“I need to run the USA. I don’t need to run Europe,” he said.
“I’m involved in Europe very much. NATO calls me daddy,” he added, pointing to the alliance’s adoption this yr of Trump’s push to extend members’ share of defence spending from two per cent of GDP to 5 per cent.
Trump had repeatedly threatened to not come to NATO allies’ defence within the event of an attack unless they stepped up their military spending.
Canada, a founding member of the NATO alliance, has said it’s going to reach the 2 per cent goal this yr and will likely be spending 3.5 per cent of GDP on core defence needs by 2035, with the remaining 1.5 per cent covered by defence-related infrastructure.
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Trump’s latest national security strategy says the U.S. should include “ending the perception, and stopping the truth, of NATO as a perpetually expanding alliance.”
Asked if there are members that he believes shouldn’t be in NATO, Trump said there are “countries which can be difficult for NATO” to take care of diplomatically, pointing to Turkey for example.
“Every time they’ve an issue with (Turkish President Recep) Erdogan, they ask me to call, because they’ll’t speak to him,” he said. “He’s a tricky cookie. I actually like him lots … and I all the time work it out with him.”
When asked if he feels NATO should stop accepting latest members, Trump said, “there aren’t that many left,” without explaining what he meant.
NATO’s membership has grown from 12 members when it was founded in 1949 to 32 today. Finland and Sweden are the alliance’s newest members, joining in 2023 and 2024, respectively.
“It was all the time, long before (Russian President Vladimir) Putin, it was an understanding that Ukraine wouldn’t be going into NATO,” he added. “And now they’ve pushed.”
Ukraine applied for NATO membership after Russia invaded the country in 2022. While the bid gained support from the alliance and the Biden administration on the time, the U.S. under Trump has taken Russia’s position in opposing Ukraine’s membership in negotiations to finish the war.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with NATO and European leaders in London on Monday as he seeks to shore up support amid U.S. pressure to simply accept a take care of Russia that features conceding land.
Moscow has routinely criticized NATO expansion as a threat against Russia. The alliance insists it’s defensive in nature.
The brand new U.S. national security strategy includes scathing critiques of European countries’ migration and free speech policies, suggesting they face the “prospect of civilizational erasure” and raising doubts about their long-term reliability as American partners.
“Over the long run, it’s greater than plausible that inside a number of a long time at the most recent, certain NATO members will grow to be majority non-European,” it says.
“As such, it’s an open query whether they are going to view their place on this planet, or their alliance with the USA, in the identical way as those that signed the NATO charter.”
The strategy highlights the increased defence spending commitment pushed by Trump, which it says creates a “burden-sharing network” organized and supported by the U.S.
“The times of the USA propping up all the world order like Atlas are over,” it says.
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