The return of American politician and businessman Donald Trump to the presidency of the United States could mean a refusal to help Ukraine and a threat to the entire NATO.
The New York Times writes about this, where the possible consequences of Trump's return to the White House are analyzed.
- Threat to NATO
- Is it possible to abandon Ukraine?
- “Everyone owes us money”
- Attitude towards transactions
- Support movement
Threat to NATO
For 74 years, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization has been America's most important military alliance. Presidents of both parties have seen NATO as a means of increasing the influence of the United States, uniting countries on both sides of the Atlantic in an oath to protect each other.
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— Donald Trump has made it clear that he views NATO as a drain on American resources by freeloaders. He has held this point of view for a quarter of a century, — writes NYT.
In his 2000 book The America We Deserve Trump wrote that “retreating from Europe would save our country millions of dollars in year”. After becoming president, he repeatedly threatened to withdraw the United States from the alliance.
However, in an effort to regain the White House, Trump has said virtually nothing about his intentions. There's a cryptic sentence on his campaign website:
— We must complete the process of fundamental reassessment of NATO's purpose and mission begun under my administration.
He and his team refuse to elaborate.
This vague phrase has created enormous uncertainty and anxiety among European allies and American supporters of the country's traditional foreign policy role.
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European ambassadors and think tank staff are trying to communicate with Trump's associates to find out about his intentions. At least one ambassador, Finnish Mikko Hautala, approached Trump directly and tried to convince him of his country's value to NATO as a new member, according to two people. familiar with the course of the conversations.
In interviews over the past few months, more than half a dozen current and former European diplomats, speaking on condition of anonymity because of fears of retaliation from Trump if he wins, said there is growing concern within embassy ranks and in their governments that… 60~strong>Trump's return could mean not only a abandonment of Ukraine, but also a broader American retreat from the continent and the destruction of the Atlantic Alliance.
— There is great fear in Europe that a second Trump presidency will lead to the actual withdrawal of the United States from NATO. This would be a huge strategic and historical failure on the part of our country, — said James G. Stavridis, a retired four-star Navy admiral who served as NATO's Supreme Allied Commander from 2009 to 2013.
Created after World War II to maintain peace in Europe and as a bulwark against the Soviet Union, NATO has become the vehicle through which the United States cooperates with allies on military issues around the world. His initial goal — the essence of which is the collective defense provision known as Article 5, which states that an armed attack against any NATO member “is considered an attack against all” — lives on, especially for new members such as Poland and the Baltic states, which were once under the rule of the Soviet Union and continue to fear Russia.
Interviews with current and former diplomats show that European officials are largely out of ideas on how to deal with Trump other than returning to the old pattern of flattery and transactional tributes.
Smaller countries more vulnerable to Russian attacks are expected to try to buy Trump's favor by increasing orders for American weapons or — as Poland did during his reign — name the military base Fort Trump in exchange for him establishing a permanent presence there.
At this stage of the campaign, Trump is focused on the criminal cases against him and on defeating his rivals in the Republican primaries and rarely talks about NATO, even in private.
While he maintains a significant lead in his campaign for the Republican nomination, the implications for America's oldest and most important military alliance — these are not Trump's clearly stated plans, but a confusion of widespread suspicions charged with uncertainty.
Is it possible to abandon Ukraine?
The New York Times writes that amid these swirling doubts, one thing is certain: The first area where Trump's potential return to the White House in 2025 could trigger a foreign policy crisis will be Ukraine and the alliance of Western democracies supporting its defense against Russian invasion.
Helping Ukraine in the fight against the attempted Russian conquest became decisive for NATO.
Camille Grand, who was NATO's assistant secretary general for defense investment at the start of the war, said how Trump handles Ukraine will be the first “big test” that Europeans will use to assess how reliable an ally — or not — he may be in the second term.
— Will he throw Zelensky under the bus in the first three months of his term? — asked Grand, who now works at the European Council on Foreign Relations, referring to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Trump has repeatedly stated that he will somehow resolve the war “in 24 hours”. He didn't say how, but he backed that statement up with suggestions that he could prevent war by striking a deal in which Ukraine would simply cede to Russia its eastern lands illegally seized by President Vladimir Putin.
Zelensky said that Ukraine will never agree to cede its lands to Russia as part of a peace agreement. But Trump will have enormous influence on the Ukrainian government, the NYT believes. The United States supplies Ukraine with vast amounts of vital weapons, ammunition, and intelligence. European countries have pledged to provide as much economic assistance as possible to Ukraine, but will not be able to make up the shortfall if America stops sending military aid.
Some of Trump's allies in the US Congress, who follow his example and preach the mantra “America First”, are already opposed to providing further military assistance to Kyiv. And in a sign of waning support, Senate Republicans last week blocked an emergency spending bill to further fund Russia's war against Ukraine, demanding Democratic concessions on immigration policy as a condition of its passage.
But even if Congress does provide additional aid, Trump may refuse to provide it — as he did in 2019 when he tried to force Zelensky to announce a criminal investigation into incumbent US President Joe Biden, an abuse of power scandal that led to Trump's first impeachment.
Against this backdrop, Russia's battlefield strategy so far has been one of biding time: It attacks when it sees opportunities and pins down Ukrainian forces, but does not take paradigm-shifting steps or negotiate, officials say . This stagnation suggests that Putin has calculated that he could be in a much better position after the 2024 US elections.
“Everyone owes us money”
Trump likes to boast that he privately told NATO leaders that if Russia attacks them and they don't pay the money they owe NATO and the US, he won't defend them. At a rally in October, he argued that after he said “everyone owes us money” and there are “delays”, he voiced this threat at the meeting, and thus “hundreds of billions of dollars flowed in”.
This story is confusing at best, the NYT notes.
There was a dispute about spending, but it was about the Europeans fulfilling their obligations to spend on their own militaries, not about money they somehow owed to NATO or the United States. Under the Trump administration they have actually increased military spending — although not for the same amounts as Trump claims. And in 2023, their spending will increase significantly in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
But Trump's obsession with retelling his story, combined with his past dissatisfaction with NATO, is raising new concerns among NATO supporters.
When asked by The New York Times to explain what he meant by “fundamental revaluation” NATO's mission and goals, Trump issued a rambling statement that did not provide a clear answer but expressed skepticism about alliances.
— It is the responsibility of every US President to ensure that America's alliances serve to protect the American people and do not recklessly endanger American blood and treasure, — Trump said in a statement.
Some pro-NATO Trump supporters say Trump is bluffing. They say he just wants to put pressure on the Europeans to spend more on their own defense.
— He's not going to do this. But what it will do is force people to pay more, and I think that will be welcome news for a lot of people, — said Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina and a Trump supporter, about the prospect of Mr. Trump withdrawing from NATO.
Robert O’Brien, who was Trump's last national security adviser, echoed this sentiment.
— President Trump is leaving NATO — This is an issue that some people in Washington are discussing, but I don't think it's realistic. He understands the military value of the alliance to America, but he just feels — and rightly so, I might add, — that we are being played by the Germans and other countries who refuse to pay their fair share for their own defense, — said O’Brian.
However, John Bolton, a conservative “hawk”, served as national security adviser from 2018 to 2019, wrote in his memoirs that Trump had to be repeatedly dissuaded from leaving NATO. In an interview, Bolton said that “I have no doubt” is that in his second term Trump will withdraw the United States from NATO.
From a legal perspective, the question of whether Trump can unilaterally withdraw the United States from NATO is likely to be contested.
The Constitution requires the consent of the Senate to ratify the treaty, but does not contain procedures for its abrogation. This has led to debate over whether presidents can do this on their own or whether they need permission from lawmakers. There are only a few legal precedents on this issue, but none of them are conclusive.
The decisions to nullify the treaties by President Jimmy Carter in 1978 and President George W. Bush in 2001 led to lawsuits being filed by members of the U.S. Congress that were rejected by courts, including on the basis that these disputes are a “political issue” that should be decided by the elected branches of government. Although the legal precedents are not entirely clear, both of these presidents actually won: the treaties were generally agreed to be unenforceable.
However, any attempt to withdraw from NATO would likely entail a broader challenge.
In response to Trump's threats, some lawmakers — led by Senator Tim Kaine, a Democrat from Virginia, and Senator Marco Rubio, a Republican from Florida, — included a provision in the annual National Defense Authorization Act, which Congress is likely to vote on this month. It says the president should not withdraw the United States from NATO without congressional approval. However, whether the Constitution allows the president's hands to be tied is also controversial.
And European diplomats say that even if Trump nominally keeps the United States in NATO, they fear he could so undermine the United States' credibility in implementing collective defense provisions that its value as a deterrent to Russia is lost.< /p>
Attitude towards transactions
The uncertainty caused by Trump's maximalist yet vague rhetoric stems from his past displays of consistent skepticism toward NATO and unusual concern for Russia.
As a candidate in 2016, Trump infuriated NATO allies by saying that if Russia attacked the Baltic states, he would decide whether to come to their aid only after checking “have they fulfilled their obligations to us”. He also repeatedly praised Putin and said he would consider recognizing Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea.
Since becoming president in July 2018, Trump not only almost withdrew from NATO at the alliance's summit, but also called the European Union “the enemy” because of what “they do to us in trade”. He then attended a summit with Putin, after which he expressed skepticism about the idea that the United States should go to war to defend a tiny NATO ally — Montenegro.
With no experience in the military or government, Trump brought a mercantile approach to relations with allies, writes NYT. He tended to base his views of foreign nations on personal relationships with their leaders and on trade imbalances.
Trump particularly disliked Angela Merkel, the former German chancellor, and often complained that German automakers were flooding America with their products. His defenders say his anger was somewhat justified: Germany was not meeting its military spending commitments, and despite his objections, Merkel was pushing ahead with a gas pipeline project to Russia. Germany suspended the project only two days before Russia invaded Ukraine.
Trump allies also point out that he approved sending anti-tank weapons to Ukraine, something President Obama did not do after Russia seized Crimea in 2014.
However, in 2020, Trump decided to withdraw a third of the 36 thousand American troops stationed in Germany. Some of them were to return home, as he preferred, and the other part was redeployed to other European countries. But the following year, as Russia built up troops on its border with Ukraine, Biden reversed that decision and added troops to Germany in a show of support for NATO.
Support movement
According to the New York Times, if Trump returns to power, he will be supported by a conservative movement that has become more skeptical of allies and US involvement abroad.
Anti-interventionist foreign policy institutions are more organized and better funded than during the Trump administration. Among them — The Center for American Renewal, a pro-Trump think tank, which published a paper entitled The US Pivot from Europe to a Dormant NATO, which makes the case for minimizing America's role in NATO.
November 1 Heritage Foundation — a traditionally hawkish conservative think tank that has recently shifted toward Trumpism, including on issues of opposing aid to Ukraine, — hosted the delegation of the European Council on Foreign Relations.
The Europeans exchanged views with ardent nationalists, including Michael Anton, a National Security Council official in the Trump administration; Dan Caldwell, who directed foreign policy at the Center for American Renewal; and national security aides to Senator J.D. Vance of Ohio and other pro-Trump senators.
Michael Anton told the Europeans that he could imagine Trump issuing an ultimatum: If NATO members don't increase their military spending by a deadline, he will pull the United States out of the alliance, according to two people who attended the meeting. When the meeting ended, Eckart von Kladen, a former German politician and now head of the Mercedes-Benz Group, asked Anton to ask Trump to talk to America's European allies when he will develop its foreign policy.
However, the NYT believes that this appears to be wishful thinking.
In his statement to The Times, Trump referred to his slogan America First — a phrase once popularized by American isolationists who opposed participation in World War II.
— My top priority, — Trump said in a statement, — Always has been and always will be America first — protecting our own country, our own borders, our own values and our own people, including their jobs and well-being.
