NATO Bows To Trump

President Donald Trump wants one big thing from next week’s NATO leader’s summit — and European leaders are itching to give it to him. That doesn’t guarantee the president will be satisfied.

The 32-nation transatlantic military alliance will pledge to dramatically increase spending on defense to 5 percent of gross domestic product — 3.5 percent on hard military expenditures and 1.5 percent on more loosely defined defense-related efforts. The commitment, a watershed moment that could rebalance transatlantic security, will allow Trump, who’s been demanding Europe pick up more of the burden for its own defense, a significant victory on the world stage.

“There is no way they would be going to 5 percent without Trump,” said one administration official, who was granted anonymity to share the president’s views. “So he sees this as a major win, and it is.”

Trump intends to deliver a speech Wednesday at the summit’s conclusion heralding the new spending pledge and his own catalytic role. But Trump’s victory won’t prevent him from pressuring countries to do even more, faster, which could prove difficult for some in the alliance. Spain, the NATO member with the lowest defense spending rate, isasking for an exemption from the new pledge and there is broad disagreement over the date by which this spending pledge is to be met.

“They’re thinking of a timeline that is, frankly, a decade,” said Ivo Daalder, a former U.S. ambassador to NATO under President Barack Obama. “Trump is probably thinking of a timeline that is by the end of this decade, if not sooner. That’s where I think [the summit] can blow up.”