By Shashi P.B.B. Malla

U.S. President Donald Trump has again and again questioned the raison d’etre of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, although he should very well know that the military organization is in the interests of all the member states.

Thus, it is not only awkward, but downright stupid when he questions NATO’s secretary general Mark Rutte (a former prime minister of the Netherlands) as to why the United States should still stay in the organization founded just after the Second World War.

Trump’s longstanding hostility to the trans-Atlantic alliance boiled over during his recent war with Iran.

Some European countries – opposed to his unilateral conduct and also not approved by his own Congress – had temporarily denied

American forces access to their military bases, and many declined his plea for help

in reopening the Strait of Hormuz connecting the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman and the wider Arabian Sea.

Trump railed in response, threatening to leave the 77-year-old military alliance for good.

Rutte quickly went to Washington and convinced him that this was not a good idea (Massimo Calabresi, The New York Times, July 7).

Since taking the reins at NATO headquarters, Brussels in 2024, Rutte, 59, has faced regular diplomatic explosions ignited by Trump, who claims the Europeans are free-riding, fair-weather friends.

In response, Rutte has pursued a simple but dexterous strategy to save the alliance: Placate Trump in public and private overwhelmingly, then use his threats to push European countries to build up their atrophied militaries (Calabresi, NYT).

Ideally, a fairer division of costs will keep the U.S. in the alliance, according to this way of thinking.

If not, at least Europe will be able to defend itself in the long run.

At last year’s NATO summit in The Hague, Netherlands, Rutte persuaded the Europeans to spend more on their militaries.

Now his challenge is to get them to spend it in ways that will bind the alliance closer together, strategically and practically.

Having once again mollified Trump, Rutte utilized his opportunity in this month’s summit at Ankara, Turkey when the 32-member states again met.

So far, the perennially optimistic Rutte keeps running into the same European shortcomings that have bedevilled the alliance for decades – industrial protectionism, nationalist distrust and an instinct to blame America for everything (NYT).

France and Germany cannot even agree to work together on traditional platforms such as jets and air defences.

How will they effectively join forces on new weapons, like air and sea drones?

As they dither, the Europeans’ historical inability to cooperate in defence production is becoming a dangerous weak link for NATO (Calabresi).

The danger isn’t theoretical, but very much present and current, according to Calabresi, the NYT’s opinion editor at large.

NATO’s rolling crisis has changed the incentives for Vladimir Putin, the alliance’s biggest adversary.

As the comparatively pro-Russian Trump presidency turns toward its final years (until 2028) and Europe remilitarizes, Putin may conclude that his chance to permanently damage NATO is slipping away.

In late June of this year, Latvian intelligence and Polish leaders said Russia was preparing military provocations against alliance countries.

As one European ambassador in Brussels stated, “Putin’s window to destroy NATO is closing.”

Rutte’s Strategy

European leaders were panicked by Trump’s second election in 2024.

Trump’s first term demand was that NATO countries spend at least 4 percent of their GDPs on their militaries – a number he would soon raise to 5 percent.

Few believed Europeans would agree and adjust.

Some thought Trump was creating an excuse to blow up the alliance.

But Rutte achieved the impossible. He was successful in sealing the spending deal at The Hague in late June 2025.

Not only that, Trump adopted a surprisingly soft tone toward the alliance.

The Hague summit may have been a validation of Rutte’s approach toward Trump.

However, saving NATO itself has proved a harder challenge.

The Dismal State of European Defence

European members have underspent on their armed forces in the decades since the fall of the Berlin Wall, and their military readiness as a result has tanked.

Their over-dependence on American might was evident.

Britain has only a small fraction of the warships it had then. The state of its nuclear arsenal is in question. (France is the only other member with such weapons).

Germany went decades ignoring NATO’s spending target of 2 percent of GDP and has fewer than 200,000 active-duty service members, before the deal.

A few frontline states such as Poland and Finland have militaries capable of going toe-to-toe with Russia.

None can replace U.S. capabilities, including airlifts, air-to-air refuelling, battlefield intelligence and the ability to precisely strike targets deep in enemy territory.

Since The Hague, most NATO members are spending more on their militaries, most importantly Germany, which is on track to get 5 percent of GDP before the agreement’s 2035 deadline.

The need to coordinate is only getting more urgent as the priorities of warfare are changing.

Trump continues to make waves

Within days of ousting the Venezuelan strongman Nicholas Maduro last January, Trump mused anew about taking Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark, a founding NATO member.

Over the following weeks, the alliance nearly fractured as various European countries sent small defensive detachments to the territory and Trump officials upped their own threats.

Rutte again saved the day, getting Trump to back down at the January economic forum in Davos, Switzerland by pushing a NATO-led collaboration known as Artic Sentry.

In an interview that Britain’s Daily Telegraph published in April, Trump threatened he was considering pulling out of the alliance.

After Rutte talked him down during the April meeting, by telling him that leaving NATO would undercut his victory at The Hague, Trump shifted to curtailing American troop deployments in Germany and Poland.

Nothing went wrong at the Ankara summit. Trump did make some noise about Greenland and chided the leftist Spanish prime minister, Perdro Sanchez about his meagre defence contribution.

Rutte had deliberately planned a short summit with short meetings to keep the mistrust and squabbling at bay.

However, as Calabresi writes, “the problem is no longer just whether America will be a good ally to Europe. It’s whether Europeans can be good allies for themselves” (NYT).

The writer can be reached at: shashimalla125@gmail.com