U.S. President Donald Trump is considering leaving the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), he told British newspaper the Telegraph on Wednesday.
Trump called the 77-year-old U.S.-led military alliance a “paper tiger” and said Russian President Vladimir Putin “knows that too,” in an interview with the Telegraph.
Trump, who has been frustrated by U.S. allies refusing to become involved within the U.S. war on Iran and the following efforts to force Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz to full international traffic, was asked within the interview if he would reconsider ending U.S. membership within the alliance.
“Oh yes, I’d say [it’s] beyond reconsideration. I used to be never swayed by NATO. I at all times knew they were a paper tiger, and Putin knows that too, by the way in which,” Trump said within the interview.
The Strait of Hormuz accounts for one-third of the worldwide oil trade and has been closed for weeks, with Iran blockading the important thing waterway because it exchanges strikes with the U.S. and Israel.
Trump said he was frustrated with allies “not being there” to assist the U.S.
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“Beyond not being there, it was actually hard to consider. And I didn’t do an enormous sale. I just said, ‘Hey,’ you already know, I didn’t insist an excessive amount of. I just think it ought to be automatic,” he said.
Trump’s explanations for why the U.S. launched the attacks on Iran have shifted repeatedly over recent weeks because the war began on Feb. 28.
Earlier this month, Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand said NATO had not received a proper request from Washington for member countries to formally launch efforts to secure the Strait of Hormuz.
“To our knowledge, a request has not been made to NATO for the kind of assistance that’s being requested and Canada, as a founding member of NATO, continues to support the principles of collective defence,” she said.
In his Telegraph interview, Trump said the U.S. has “been there” to support Ukraine against Russia’s invasion.
“We’ve been there routinely, including Ukraine. Ukraine wasn’t our problem. It was a test, and we were there for them, and we’d at all times have been there for them. They weren’t there for us,” he said.
Trump has long criticized NATO members for not increasing their defence spending. In June 2025, Canada joined other NATO countries in pledging five per cent of its budget on defence spending by 2035.
Last week, NATO confirmed that Canada has hit its goal of spending two per cent of its GDP on national defence by March of this 12 months.
Trump on Wednesday also claimed that Iran’s president wanted a ceasefire ahead of his speech to the American people set for later this evening.
Trump made the claim on his Truth Social website. Iran had no immediate response to Trump’s post.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, in an interview with Al Jazeera aired late Tuesday, signalled Tehran’s willingness to maintain fighting.
“You can’t speak to the people of Iran within the language of threats and deadlines,” he said. “We don’t set any deadline for defending ourselves.”
— with files from The Associated Press.
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