Member states are reportedly wary of a shift in US policy towards the bloc if Donald Trump is reelected as president
Western countries should not create “self-fulfilling prophecies” suggesting that a second Donald Trump presidency would mean the end of NATO, the bloc’s Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has said.
In an interview with The Guardian published on Thursday, the NATO chief said member countries should not fear for the bloc’s future under Trump, but build a relationship with his administration like they did in 2016 regardless of his campaign rhetoric.
“What we decided in 2016 was, of course, [to] engage with the new administration, not least because the questions were asked about whether [the US was] supportive of NATO,” Stoltenberg told the outlet on the sidelines of the European Political Community (EPC) meeting at Blenheim Palace in the UK.
In an apparent effort to appease NATO members, Stoltenberg claimed that Trump’s criticism had not been directed at the US-led military bloc itself but towards countries that were not spending enough on defense.
Many NATO states have for years struggled to reach an agreed threshold of 2% of GDP for defense spending, but this push gained momentum after the start of the Ukraine crisis in 2014 and especially after the launch of Russia’s military operation in 2022.
According to The Guardian, efforts to make Western Europe “Trump-proof” were among the priorities at the EPC gathering amid fears that the US presidential hopeful is reportedly considering options to stop the Ukraine conflict, including a deal with Russia and barring NATO expansion.
Concerns have reportedly been raised by some NATO member countries over a possible shift in US foreign policy after Trump announced Ohio Senator J.D. Vance, who is a strong opponent of Washington’s aid for Kiev and a staunch critic of US involvement in foreign conflicts, as his running mate.
Addressing the Republican National Convention on Wednesday, the vice presidential candidate promised that a second Trump administration would only send American troops to war when absolutely necessary.
Earlier this year, Vance wrote in an op-ed for the New York Times that Washington’s insistence on not negotiating with Russia was “absurd,” while Vladimir Zelensky’s goal of restoring Ukraine’s 1991 borders was “fantastical.”
In a report published earlier this month, Politico alleged citing Trump-aligned national security experts that the Republican is “unlikely” to quit NATO outright, but could overhaul the bloc to make its European members take on more responsibility.
The article also indicated that Trump was mulling a deal to guarantee that NATO would cease its eastward expansion into Ukraine and Georgia, and negotiate “with Russian President Vladimir Putin over how much Ukrainian territory Moscow can keep.”
