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President Trump has called NATO a paper tiger and has complained that some NATO states aren't letting the U.S. and Israel use NATO bases in their war against Iran. The comments have many wondering if the president will try to withdraw from the Western Alliance or if he can. NPR's Michele Kelemen takes a look.
MICHELE KELEMEN, BYLINE: President Trump has run hot and cold on NATO during his second term. He boasts about getting NATO countries to agree to pay more. But after Spain announced it wouldn't let the U.S. use its bases or airspace for the war in Iran, Trump again questioned whether NATO is worth it.
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PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We were there for them. But they were not there for us.
KELEMEN: Italy, France, the U.K. and Poland have all taken steps to limit the Trump administration's ability to use their bases for offensive actions against Iran. NATO is a defensive alliance, as one former U.S. ambassador to NATO, Ivo Daalder, puts it.
IVO DAALDER: They're not NATO obligations. They're not doing it because they think the war is illegal, and they don't want to participate in that war and therefore be part of an illegal operation. But Trump certainly reads it as a direct violation of what it means to be an ally.
KELEMEN: Daalder, who was NATO ambassador during the Obama administration, says Trump has always been skeptical of NATO's Article 5 commitment that says an attack on one is an attack on all, but Trump had advisors in the first term who were committed to it. Now Secretary of State Marco Rubio is raising some doubts, telling Al Jazeera this week that one of the main benefits of NATO is the basing rights.
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MARCO RUBIO: But if NATO is just about us defending Europe if they're attacked but them denying us basing rights when we need them, that's not a very good arrangement. That's a hard one to stay engaged in and say, this is good for the United States. So all of them is going to have to be reexamined.
KELEMEN: In a joint statement, Democratic Senator Jeanne Shaheen and Republican Thom Tillis warned that withdrawing from NATO would fulfill the dreams of Russia's Vladimir Putin and China's Xi Jinping and undermine America's national security interests. They also point out that when he was a senator, Rubio co-sponsored a law that says no U.S. president can withdraw from NATO without Senate approval. But former ambassador Daalder, who's now a senior fellow at the Belfer Center at the Harvard Kennedy School, doubts that legislation would really prevent President Trump from trying, and Daalder says Trump's rhetoric is already having an impact.
DAALDER: It weakens the deterrent capability of the alliance. It shows the alliance is divided, and at its core, it is NATO's unity as much as the capabilities that the united NATO can bring to bear that is important in order to communicate a deterrent capability to our adversaries.
KELEMEN: Daalder says NATO has been good for America, helping Europe emerge from World War II and counter the Soviet Union. Members have to give a one-year notice - ironically, to the U.S. government - in order to withdraw from the alliance. No country has ever done that. In fact, NATO expanded in the post-Cold War era, adding two new countries after Russia began its full-scale war against Ukraine.
DAALDER: We have a choice. Shall we try to rebuild that kind of security alliance system that has worked so well for 80 years? Or are we going to adapt the same behavior as the Russians and decide that because we are powerful, we can do what we want, and others will have to do what they must?
KELEMEN: Daalder is clearly in the first camp. NATO secretary general Mark Rutte, who has a good relationship with Trump, is coming to the White House next week. The White House confirmed that in an email to NPR. Michele Kelemen, NPR News, the State Department. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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