NATO members' collective defense vow holds — for now

Arab News

a day ago

https://arab.news/p76g6
The pendulum of relations between NATO and Washington has swung from side to side a few times since Donald Trump won the US presidential election for the first time in 2016. It reached an all-time low in his first term, leading his successor Joe Biden, in one of his first acts after taking office, to reassure NATO members of America's commitment to the organization and its Article 5, which is the cornerstone of the alliance and states that an armed attack against one member is considered an attack against all members.
Now, in the aftermath of Trump's return to the White House, he and the NATO leadership seem to have found a modus vivendi, albeit very much on Trump's terms, whereby all members substantially increase their defense spending.
As has become customary before a summit or international visit by the US president, there is a sense of trepidation. This is most keenly felt by the NATO members that, and not without good reason, are uncertain about the US under Trump's presidency and its commitment to this alliance, the security of Europe and the most acute and urgent issue of supporting Ukraine.
NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte embodied this anxiety in sending very flattering text messages to Trump on the eve of last month's summit in The Hague, stating that 'Europe is going to pay in a BIG way, as they should, and it will be your win.' He added that Trump had achieved what 'no American president in decades could get done.' This correspondence, which was supposed to be private, seemingly pleased Trump enough for him to post it on his social media platform.
These attempts to keep the Trump administration on board are coming at a heavy financial cost, but they have nevertheless been necessary and long overdue. Whether they have been a response to Trump's relentless pressure on member states to increase their defense budgets or to the realization that the post-Cold War bonanza of 'butter instead of cannons' is over, it is clear that maintaining Western-style democracies and their values must be backed by investing, and massively so, in the rebuilding of the West's military muscle.
The trajectory of substantial increases in defense budgets began as a result of Russia's aggression against its Ukrainian neighbor, which illustrated that Europe faces a threat very close to home. The current commitment by the allies to hike their defense budgets to 5 percent of gross domestic product, to be reached within a decade, is a huge leap that only a year ago would have been unthinkable.
The alliance is at its best when it is united, coherent in its objectives and prepared to use military force
Yossi Mekelberg
Admittedly, out of this 5 percent, 'only' 3.5 percent of GDP will be allocated directly to defense, 'based on the agreed definition of NATO defense expenditure by 2035 to resource core defense requirements, and to meet the NATO Capability Targets.' But beyond this very bureaucratic language lies a sea change which means that Europe and Canada can no longer rely on the US alone for their security and must play a much more proactive part, backed by adequate resources.
The war in Ukraine no doubt helped to focus the minds of NATO members on the fact that they face real threats and that the deterministic approach that assumes that liberal democracies are not only immune from threat, but also too attractive a proposition not to be emulated by other countries, are long gone. Moreover, the lingering ideological and socioeconomic crisis in the US also means that it has no intention of indefinitely shouldering the main burden of securing the West.
It can be argued, and not without justification, that setting a target to be achieved in a decade, while the security threats are very much present right now, could hardly be the answer, especially considering that the additional 1.5 percent is not on core defense spending on troops and weapons but allocated to 'defense-related expenditure.'
Nevertheless, this is a significant change in the attitude to security and how to achieve it in Europe and Canada. And at least for the remaining years of the current American administration, the other members of the alliance know that Washington will be watching like a hawk to ensure that they stand by their commitments. But it is also an important signal, first and foremost to Russia, as well as to China and any nonstate actors that pose a threat to security and international stability, that Europe is building up its military force, mainly as a deterrent, but it will not be afraid to use it if necessary.
One of the most important takeaways from The Hague summit was that, by the end of it all, countries affirmed their commitment to collective defense as enshrined in Article 5 of the Washington Treaty. In other words, at least for now, America's commitment to the glue that keeps NATO together and relevant, of mutual responsibility for the 32 members to protect each other and the freedom and democracy of their 1 billion citizens, holds.
However, the biggest and most immediate challenge for NATO is to prevent Russia gaining the upper hand in Ukraine and, currently, the mixed messages from Washington are not helping this cause. Ukraine is under immense military pressure from Russia, whether on the front line or in the intensity of drone attacks on centers of population, which also affect morale and add to the war fatigue.
While Trump said toward the end of last week that he came away disappointed from a telephone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin because it does not appear that the Russian leader is looking to stop the war against Ukraine, his administration also held back some weapons shipments to Ukraine at a crucial time, apparently due to a review of military spending. Not an encouraging response.
NATO's importance as a collective security mechanism for defending its members' liberal-democratic way of life has not diminished over the years, although it has seen changes in terms of the challenges it faces and the methods of addressing them, whether this is traditional warfare, hybrid warfare, fighting nonstate actors or increasing cybersecurity defenses.
The alliance is at its best when it is united, coherent in its objectives and prepared to use military force either to protect itself or those that are prey to aggressors such as Russia in Ukraine. NATO is facing major tests and it cannot afford transatlantic divisions or being under-resourced, a situation that at least for now seems to have been considerably improved.
• Yossi Mekelberg is a professor of international relations and an associate fellow of the MENA Program at Chatham House.
X: @YMekelberg