The U.S President Donald Trump said the United States would punish members of the 29-member NATO alliance with trade blocks if he has determined those countries aren’t fulfilling their commitments to military defense spending. Trump also failed to confirm that the U.S would defend those countries if they’re attacked. He was seated next to French President Emmanuel Macron at the NATO summit in London. Trump said that the United States will deal with countries from a trade standpoint or in a different way if they’re delinquent in their defense spending commitments. He added that it isn’t fair that NATO allies help defend countries that haven’t committed at least 2% of their spending on defense.
Trump said, “If something happens, we’re supposed to protect them? It’s not really fair. If they don’t want to, I’ll have to do something with respect to trade. With trade, I have all the cards”. It is noteworthy that Trump has previously complained that the U.S carries too much defense burden of NATO. He urged that allies should meet defense spending targets while pushing his America First agenda. The United States spends 3.4% of its GDP on defense. It is at least 1 full percentage point above Greece at 2.22% and the UK at 2.15%. More than 20 other NATO countries fall below the 2% guideline. But military spending has increased significantly over the last decade before Trump took to office.
Point to be noted that Macron described the alliance as going through a Brain Death. Trump responded to his appearance in London. Trump said that Macron’s statement is insulting to military membership of NATO. He said, “When you make a statement like that, that is a very, very nasty statement”. Trump had proposed retaliatory tariffs on French imports after the country’s digital tax proposal against the U.S companies like Amazon, Facebook, and Google. He said Canada was slightly delinquent in its military spending target. But, Trudeau defended its spending and mentioned recent investments in fighter jets and its naval fleet.