President Donald Trump is considering changing U.S. engagement with NATO to favor members who spend a set percentage of their GDP on defense, NBC News reports.
Officials told the network that under the changed policy, the U.S. might not come to the aid of a NATO member that has been attacked if they don’t spend a certain amount of their GDP (Gross Domestic Product) on defense. The change would be a departure from NATO’s Article 5, which states that an attack on one country is an attack on all.
Three current and former senior U.S. officials and one congressional official spoke to NBC, saying that the U.S. may also prioritize military exercises with NATO members spending a certain percentage of their GDP on defense.
The Trump administration has already indicated that it may draw down the U.S. military presence in Europe. The officials told NBC that an option being considered is to move some U.S. troops to NATO nations that have increased their defense spending to meet the percentage of GDP required.
“President Trump is committed to NATO and Article V,” a National Security Council official told NBC in a statement.
But on Thursday afternoon in the Oval Office, Trump made extensive comments denigrating NATO members as unreliable, arguing that it was “common sense” not to defend countries not funding their armed forces properly.
“If they don’t pay, I’m not going to defend them,” said Trump.
The president said his “biggest problem” with NATO was that "If the United States was in trouble and we called them.” He added: “ 'We got a problem, France’ ... Do you think they're going to come and protect us? They're supposed to. I'm not so sure."
During his first term, Trump threatened to withdraw the U.S. from NATO, and he has raised doubts about the need for Article 5 for the U.S. While the article was initially intended to protect European countries from the Soviet Union during the Cold War, it has only been activated once since — following the 9/11 terror attacks on the U.S. in 2001.
Trump said Thursday that he has told NATO members in the past: “If you're not going to pay, we're not going to defend.”
Before Trump’s comments, Senator Chris Coons of Delaware, the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee for Defense and a member of the Foreign Relations panel, told NBC that Matthew Whitaker, the president’s nominee to be the U.S. ambassador to the alliance, “gave very reassuring answers” regarding the White House’s commitment to NATO and Article 5.
But Coons also noted that he was “contacted by several European ambassadors concerned about rumors that Trump might make some negative announcement about NATO.”
If “you’re not given pause by everything about President Trump’s statements and actions on foreign policy, you’re not paying attention,” Coons told NBC.
While Ukraine has pushed to be admitted into NATO, the Trump administration had stated that such a move wouldn’t be part of any peace deal.
On numerous occasions, Trump has slammed NATO members for not reaching the current NATO threshold of spending at least 2 percent of their GDP on defense. Trump has also argued that the threshold should be increased. The president has said that the difference in levels of spending is unfair and places an extra burden on the U.S.
More than a decade ago, NATO agreed on the 2 percent spending goal. Trump has argued that NATO countries should spend 5 percent of GDP on defense, which is more than the U.S. currently spends.
In January, Trump said that NATO “has to pay more,” and that “it’s ridiculous [it doesn’t] because it affects them a lot more. We have an ocean in between.”
Last year, 23 NATO members spent more than 2 percent of their GDP on defense. The U.S., Poland, Greece, Latvia, and Estonia all spent more than 3 percent on defense. Poland came out on top according to the most recent NATO figures, spending 4.12 percent of its GDP on defense.
The possible change in U.S. engagement with NATO comes as Trump is pressuring Ukraine to come to the negotiating table to end the war with Russia, and as European countries scramble to fill the gap left by a pause in U.S. aid to Ukraine.
