Trump favors enemies over friends and threatens to disrupt the international order

Shortly after former President Donald J. Trump took office, his staff explained how NATO's mutual defense commitments worked.

“Are you saying that if Russia attacked Lithuania, we would go to war with Russia?” he replied. “Thats crazy.”

Mr. Trump has never believed in the basic one-for-all, all-for-one concept of the Atlantic alliance. He spent much of his four-year presidency undermining it, pushing strong-armed members to keep promises to spend more on their own armies under the threat that he would otherwise not come to their aid.

But he took it to a whole new level this weekend, declaring at a rally in South Carolina that not only would he not defend the European countries he believed had fallen behind against an attack by Russia, but that he would even go so far as to 'encourage the European countries'. Russia “to do whatever they want” against them. Never before has a president of the United States suggested that he would incite an enemy to attack American allies.

Some may view that as typical Trump rally bluster or write it off as a poor attempt at humor. Others may even applaud the hard line against supposedly lethal allies who, in this view, have abused American friendship for too long. But Trump's rhetoric portends potentially far-reaching changes in the international order if he wins the White House again in November, with unpredictable consequences.

Moreover, Trump's riff once again raised uncomfortable questions about his taste in friends. Encouraging Russia to attack NATO allies, even if he wasn't entirely serious about it, is a stunning statement that highlights his strange affinity with President Vladimir V. Putin, who has already proven his willingness to invade neighboring countries that don't enjoy the protection of NATO.

Mr. Trump, long averse to any alliance, could in a second term effectively end the security umbrella that his friends in Europe, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East have enjoyed for much of the has protected for nearly eight decades since the end of World War II. . The very suggestion that the United States cannot be relied upon would negate the value of such alliances, prompting old friends to hedge and perhaps join other powers, and drive the likes of Putin and Xi Jinping out of China cheer on.

“Russia and China have nothing to compare with America's allies, and these allies depend on American commitment,” said Douglas E. Lute, a retired lieutenant general who served as ambassador to NATO under President Barack Obama and a top adviser to President George W. Bush. about the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. “Sowing doubt about the United States' commitment to its allies sacrifices America's greatest advantage over Russia and China, something that neither Putin nor Xi could achieve on their own.”

Undeterred by criticism of his latest comment, Trump doubled down on Sunday.

“No money in the form of foreign aid should be given to any country unless it is in the form of a loan, and not just as a giveaway,” he wrote in capital letters on social media. “We should never give money again,” he added, “without the hope of repayment, or without strings attached.”

Mr Trump has long threatened to withdraw the United States from NATO and is said to no longer be surrounded by the kind of advisers who prevented him from doing so last time. He tried to withdraw US troops from Germany at the end of his presidency out of anger at Angela Merkel, then chancellor, a withdrawal that was only prevented because President Biden came to power in time to revoke the decision.

At other points, Mr. Trump also considered withdrawing American troops from South Korea, but has said since leaving office that such a move would be a priority in a second term unless South Korea paid more. a compensation. Mr. Trump would also likely cut military aid to Ukraine as it tries to fend off Russian invaders, and he has not offered support for more aid to Israel in its war with Hamas.

Congress anticipated the possibility of a U.S. withdrawal from the world if Mr. Trump returns to office and recently passed legislation banning any president from withdrawing from the NATO treaty without Senate approval. But Trump wouldn't even have to formally leave the alliance for it to be meaningless.

And if the United States could not be counted on to come to the aid of partners in Europe, where it has the strongest historical ties, then other countries with mutual defense treaties with Washington, such as Japan, the Philippines, Thailand, Australia, New Zeeland, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica and Panama could hardly be sure of American aid.

Peter D. Feaver, a professor at Duke University and a former national security assistant to Mr. Bush and President Bill Clinton, said Mr. Trump could reduce U.S. troops in Europe to a level that would “render any military defense plans hollow” and “ would regularly make poor.” “expressing the American promise” in a way that would convince Mr. Putin that he has a free hand.

“Just doing these two things could hurt and perhaps even kill NATO,” Mr Feaver said. “And few allies or partners in other parts of the world would trust any American commitment after seeing us break NATO.”

History suggests this could result in more war, not less. When Dean Acheson, the secretary of state, described an American “defensive perimeter” in Asia in 1950 that did not include South Korea, North Korea invaded five months later, starting a bloody war that nevertheless attracted the United States.

Mr. Trump's signal to NATO allies like Poland, Finland, Estonia, Latvia and, yes, Lithuania is that they could be on their own come January. It comes just days after Mr Putin told Tucker Carlson Poland was to blame for Adolf Hitler's invasion in 1939the mood in Warsaw could hardly have been more restless.

“Article 5 has been invoked once so far – to help the US in Afghanistan after September 11,” Radek Sikorski, Poland's foreign minister, noted in an email exchange on Sunday. “Poland sent a brigade for ten years. We have not sent a bill to Washington.”

The disdain for NATO that Mr. Trump expresses is based on a false assumption that he has repeated for years, even after being corrected, a sign that he is either unable to process information that contradicts an idea- fixed in his head, or is willing to distort the facts. matching his favorite story.

As he has done so many times, Trump lambasted NATO partners, calling them “delinquent” in paying for U.S. protection. “You have to pay,” he said. “You have to pay your bills.”

In fact, NATO partners are not paying the United States, as Mr. Trump suggested. NATO members contribute to a common budget for civilian and military costs according to a formula based on national income and have historically met these obligations.

What Mr. Trump is misleadingly referring to is a goal set by NATO defense ministers in 2006, which is for each member to spend 2 percent of its gross domestic product on its own military, a standard set in 2014 by the NATO leaders have ratified the ambition to achieve this by 2024. Since last year only 11 of the 31 members have reached that level, and last summer NATO leaders pledged a “sustained commitment” to finally reaching it. But even those who didn't do so owe no money to the United States as a result.

Countries that spend as much as 2 percent of their economic output on defense include Poland and Lithuania, and this number has increased in the past two years following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which is not a NATO member. Other countries have pledged to increase spending in the coming years.

NATO spending is a legitimate concern, according to national security veterans, and Mr. Trump is not the first president to urge NATO partners to do more — Mr. Bush and Mr. Obama did so, too. But Mr. Trump is the first to present the alliance as a kind of protection fraud in which those who do not “pay up” will be abandoned by the United States, let alone subject to attacks by Russia with the encouragement of Washington.

“NATO's credibility rests on the credibility of the man who occupies the Oval Office, as it is the decisions made there that will be decisive in a critical situation,” said Carl Bildt, a former prime minister of Sweden, who is accession completes. to NATO as its 32nd member.

“This applies to what crisis management could be in a narrow involvement in the ultimate issue of the nuclear deterrent,” he said. “If Putin threatened nuclear strikes on Poland, would Trump say he doesn't care?”

Trump's fixation on getting paid by his allies extends beyond Europe. At one point he attacked the mutual defense treaty with Japan, which has been in place since 1951, and at other times he prepared to order American troops out of South Korea. During a 2021 interview shortly after leaving office, he made it clear that if he returned to power, he would demand that South Korea pay billions of dollars to keep U.S. troops there.

(In fact South Korea pays $1 billion per year and spent $9.7 billion expanding Camp Humphreys for U.S. troops; Mr. Trump said he wants $5 billion a year.)

National security veterans from both parties said the thinking misunderstands the value of the alliances to the United States. It is an advantage for the Americans, they say, to have overseas bases in places like Germany and South Korea, which allow for quick responses to crises around the world. It also deters the adventurism of outcast states such as North Korea. “America's commitment to its allies is not altruism or charity, but serves a vital national interest,” Mr. Lute said.

The uncertainty that would result from Trump's lack of commitment would lead to volatility not seen in years.

“The only saving grace,” Mr. Bildt said, “is that he will probably be so unreliable and unpredictable that even the Kremlin would be somewhat insecure. But they would know they have a fair chance to play him politically in any crisis.”