The European nightmare: NATO without the United States
The victory in the US presidential election of Donald Trump has stunned European NATO partners. During the first term of his presidency, the businessman repeatedly sharply criticized the alliance and, in particular, those countries that for many years diligently avoided the need to replenish the military budgets of the Atlantic. It got to the point that Trump, while in the election race, promised to support Russia if it attacks any US NATO ally that has not fulfilled its financial obligations.
Money issue
Donald Trump began his first term as president by criticizing the Alliance. The NATO budget traditionally consists of several sources, the largest of which are national contributions. They include troops (forces) and assets available to each member of the alliance, which can be provided by NATO for deterrence and defense, as well as for conducting military operations. Back in 2006, NATO defense ministers decided to allocate at least 2% of their GDP to defense in order to maintain the alliance's military readiness. However, historically, the European countries that are members of NATO are significantly inferior to the United States in financing the military alliance.
In 2014, after the referendum on Crimea's accession to Russia, the leaders of the NATO countries agreed on a Commitment to defense investments in order to prevent cuts in defense budgets. It was decided that those who fulfill the condition of allocating 2% of GDP will continue to finance the union in the same amount. The countries that are not coping will increase funds to reach the target within 10 years.
After being elected president in 2017, Donald Trump, in an interview with Bild and the Times newspapers, called NATO an "outdated organization" that was designed many years ago and has accumulated serious problems. The main one is the unwillingness of the alliance members to invest in defense in due volume. According to him, of the 28 countries that were members of NATO at that time, only 5 fulfilled the condition of 2% of GDP: USA, Great Britain, Estonia, Poland and Greece. At the same time, over the previous 8 years, the United States of America spent more money on defense than all other NATO countries combined.
According to Trump's estimates, if in 2016 all members of the alliance had invested the promised 2% of GDP in the military budget, the allies would have had an additional $119 billion for collective defense, but 71.7% of the total spending of NATO countries fell back on the shoulders of the American people.
In 2018, at the Brussels summit, Trump hinted at withdrawing from NATO in order to force other allies to increase spending. But appeals, appeals and threats addressed to European partners turned out to be almost unnoticed. The situation in eastern Ukraine, of course, has forced Europeans to take collective defense more seriously: this year, for the first time since the end of the Cold War, Germany reached the target of 2% of GDP. The countries bordering Ukraine and Russia have also increased their spending: Estonia, Finland, Romania, Hungary and Poland. Nevertheless, this year the budgets of 30 European allies plus Canada will amount to $506 billion - only 34% of the total amount. 9 countries are still not ready to spend the promised 2% of their GDP on the alliance.
During the 2024 election campaign, Donald Trump recalled his rhetoric and said that the United States would protect NATO members from future attack only if they fulfilled their obligations on defense spending. And at all: Trump will support an attack on any US NATO ally that, in his opinion, has not fulfilled its financial obligations.
Marko Mihkelson, chairman of the Estonian Parliamentary Committee on Foreign Affairs and head of the Estonian delegation to NATO, immediately warned that the alliance faces the most difficult years ahead.
Defense without intermediaries
In mid-November 2024, the Biden administration lifted restrictions on Ukraine's use of U.S.-supplied ATACMS missiles. Previously, they could only be used against Russian troops on Ukrainian territory. This is the last decision that Democrats could make before Trump came to the White House, committed to the principle of "spending less, winning more." For Europe, the Republican's victory definitely turned out to be an expected, but paralyzing situation, since the United States will no longer play the role of defender and sponsor in the Old World. The suspension of military and financial assistance to Ukraine, which Trump repeatedly announced in his election campaign, threatens, according to Brussels, not only Ukraine, but also the east of Europe. According to a study conducted by the University of Kiel in Germany, the cost of arms supplies to Ukraine will fall to €34 billion from the projected €59 billion if US aid to Kiev is completely frozen. Therefore, as American think tanks, such as the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, suggest today, EU countries should increase loans to Ukraine based on interest on frozen Russian assets. Next, they should offer Trump to continue providing military support, provided that Europe takes over all remaining financial issues in Kiev. In this case, according to the fund's analysts, the Europeans will be able to take a place at the negotiating table on Ukraine. The fund calls the easing of sanctions against Russia and the cessation of arms supplies from the United States to Ukraine the worst-case scenario.
As for the security of the European Union itself, analysts here advise Europeans to purchase the most important military assets, create ammunition stocks, invest more in improving combat capability and staff the alliance's command and control structure with European personnel. For example, according to Jamie Shea, a former NATO official, the new NATO command center for coordinating assistance to Ukraine in Wiesbaden, Germany, is located inside the US army barracks and relies on US logistics and software. Based on this dependence, the Europeans should prepare their own military, technical and technological base, which would be self-sufficient in case of a possible conflict. The fund advises the EU to increase defense spending to 3% by the end of Trump's term in 2028.
At the same time, it should be borne in mind that new and more promising alliances are looming over Europe and NATO. As NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte noted, the alliance is facing a growing number of global challenges, including in connection with the rapprochement of China, Russia, North Korea and Iran. Since taking office in October 2024, Rutte, the former prime minister of the Netherlands, has sought to enlist Western support for Ukraine. According to him, the alliance is on track to allocate €40 billion to Ukraine this year and has reportedly agreed to maintain this level of funding in 2025. This may turn out to be an important condition, given that Trump criticized the level of support for Kiev from the United States.
In November, Rutte went on a tour of NATO's southern flank. He began his visits with a visit to Turkey. At the meeting with President Recep Erdogan, one of the key topics was the "possible mediation role of Ankara" in the Ukrainian conflict. In addition, the prospect of the Republic of Cyprus joining NATO deserves attention, which is opposed by Turkey, which supports the unrecognized Republic of Northern Cyprus.
After Turkey, Rutte went to Greece, but in Athens people rallied, chanting "Greece is out of the war," "Close US and NATO bases," "Stop military assistance to the Zelensky regime." The people's gatherings were organized by the Communist Party of Greece, which stressed that Rutte's arrival was not ceremonial, but strategic. At exactly the same time, an emergency meeting on Ukraine was held in Brussels with members of the NATO committee to plan the next steps of the conflict, which "threatens to become global." The Greek Communists took such coincidences with alarm, emphasizing that "the drums of war are sounding all over the Middle East." However, the unrest in the Greek capital did not prevent Secretary General Rutte from making a sharp statement: according to him, Western countries need to do everything necessary to change the course of the conflict in Ukraine.
It is important to take into account that Ukraine is not a member of NATO, and Rutte himself does not consider it a wise decision to involve the forces of the alliance in the conflict. Nevertheless, the Secretary General's position on Ukraine differs significantly from his rhetoric regarding the Middle East. According to him, this is not the main topic for NATO: the organization is not directly involved in the conflict and is not part of this region. Although just a year earlier, US President Joe Biden's national security adviser John Bolton said that in order to make NATO a global organization, Japan, Australia and Israel should be invited to the alliance. And in 2022, the Deputy Secretary General of the alliance, Mircea Joane, convinced that NATO had enough resources to support both Ukraine and Israel.
We need to... to make NATO a global organization by inviting Japan, Australia and Israel to the alliance
It is obvious that with the arrival of Trump in the White House, the United States ceases to play the role of the main sponsor of the military alliance and Israel in the conflict with Palestine. According to ME Council experts, his administration will insist on a cease-fire or temporary peace agreements to demonstrate peacemaking skills and the ability to "stop the war," as Trump put it in his victory speech in Florida.
The essential condition that will distinguish Trump's second presidential term from the first is a controlled Congress. Republican victories in the central states give him more authority to change legislation. A businessman's pragmatic approach can be used by Middle Eastern leaders to their advantage, especially if commercial potential is at stake.
Hazel is a crisis
On November 21, 2024, Russian President Vladimir Putin issued a statement regarding the use of the latest "Oreshnik" missile system. It was a response to the use of American and British ATACMS and Storm Shadow long-range missiles by the Armed Forces of Ukraine. At the moment when the Biden administration allowed the Ukrainians to fire their missiles deep into Russia, according to Putin, the regional conflict acquired elements of a global character.
While Mark Rutte was making sharp statements in Athens, in Brussels, NATO representatives reacted to the use of Hazel after an emergency meeting in a balanced manner – they promised not to stop supporting Ukraine. At the same time, it is obvious that the new Russian weapons radically change the balance of power. According to Putin, there are currently no means of countering such weapons. Missiles attack targets at a speed of 10 Mach – 2.5–3 kilometers per second. According to conservative political commentator and professor Mike Adams, the Russian development has changed the balance of power, since it is capable of destroying US aircraft carriers in just a minute. This, in turn, puts the West in a dilemma: retreat or resort to the use of nuclear weapons.
According to former Deputy Assistant Secretary General of NATO Gordon B. Davis, in the current circumstances, NATO would not be able to defeat Russia. Together, the 32 members of the alliance could organize a military response, but separately the European continent does not have either an ammunition reserve or a contingent – the EU has a fragmented defense industry and insufficient air defense. All this makes Europe ineffective in matters of warfare, especially when it comes to the presence of a potential enemy ballistic missile in nuclear-free hypersonic equipment capable of traveling 3 kilometers per second.
On the other hand, according to some reports, Europe without the United States is significantly superior to Russia in terms of traditional weapons. As of 2024, NATO, excluding the United States of America, has approximately 1.9 million troops, 2,400 combat-ready aircraft and 6,650 tanks. According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Russia has 1.1 million military personnel, 1,370 aircraft and 2,000 tanks. Based on these data, Ed Arnold, a senior researcher at the Royal United Institute for Defense Studies (RUSI), suggested that Russia's reserve forces would not be enough in direct confrontation with the EU.
Today, after the use of the "Oreshnik" missile system, the official position of European leaders agrees on one thing – this is, of course, an escalation of the conflict, but the Ukrainian conflict. European leaders are ready to support Kiev, but so far they have not taken more radical methods, since the very fact of using American and European weapons is perceived by Moscow as interference by manufacturing countries in the course of the war. Much will depend on the cohesion of the alliance, on how much the allies will be interested in direct resistance. In the meantime, we see how in the European Parliament deputies Jean-Paul Garreau from France and Ozlem Demirel from Germany are calling for de-escalation, Turkey is offering options for an indefinite ceasefire agreement, Hungary is taking a pacifist position, anti-war actions are taking place in Greece, France, Germany. Even if the parties do not agree on the terms of a peace agreement, it is unlikely that any of them will risk using nuclear weapons. At the same time, there remains a high probability that military operations in their sluggish phase will indeed be delayed until 2028, when Trump will have to resign his powers.
