Donald Trump's new rant about NATO penny — or euro — pinchers sounded a lot like a rock star on the comeback trail, playing his golden oldie hits to his adoring fans.
This was a classic case of the ex-president daring to say outrageous things sure to anger the political establishment and foreign nations in order to bolster his brand as a straight-talking strongman and outsider who his supporters adore.
But the possible next president's weekend warning that he'd let Russia "do whatever the hell they want" with alliance members who don't pay enough for US protection was also a pernicious moment with grave implications.
During his first term, Trump repeatedly berated NATO leaders for being "delinquent" or in arrears to the United States, willfully misinterpreting how the most powerful military alliance in world history works, or what it achieved for 70 years. It is true that many NATO nations still have not reached the alliance's 2% of GDP target for military spending and have been overly complacent under US protection. A dangerous geopolitical age means it is incumbent on those states to do more to reach their obligations. But NATO is far more than the mafia-style protection racket Trump thinks it is. America prospered in the peace the alliance fostered after World War II as a bulwark against communism. And the superpower economy that resulted made US businessmen like Trump handsomely rich.
Twice during the last century, Washington sent its troops to end Europe's wars. The thousands of US graves across Flanders and Normandy offer moving testimony to America's instrumental role in saving democracy. But the US didn't just act altruistically — it was in its own interests to stop Nazism overwhelming the world. And NATO's Article 5 code that an attack on one member is an attack on all has been invoked only once — after the September 11, 2001, attacks when US allies, repaying their historic obligation, sent hundreds of soldiers to die in Afghanistan in America's defense. Given Trump's invective and insults, it's a good question whether they'd be so willing to do so if a similar situation were to arise in his potential second term.
The context is more alarming than it was when Trump used to travel to Europe as president and berate leaders like ex-German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
His invitation to Putin to invade US allies follows the Russian onslaught on Ukraine, a sovereign, independent democracy in the biggest land war since World War II. Putin has been accused of war crimes and he has deliberately targeted civilians, and aimed to freeze the populace to death by seeking to destroy the country's energy infrastructure in winter. Now, Trump's friends in the US Congress are looking to halt Ukraine's latest $60 billion aid package without which it will soon start running out of ammunition – partly out of revenge for President Volodymyr Zelensky's refusal to accept Trump's invitation to meddle in the 2020 election by launching a criminal probe into the Biden family.
Trump has also promised to end the war in Ukraine within 24 hours if he's elected in November. The only way he could do that is to give Putin all of his ill-gotten gains in a way that would leave the rest of Ukraine highly vulnerable to an eventual total Russian takeover. Several top GOP senators meanwhile endorsed Trump's anti-NATO rhetoric on Monday, fueling fears the ex-president could try to pull out of the alliance during a second term in a move that would send shockwaves around the world.
We're still a long way from the US turning its back on the West. But it's not impossible. And Trump and the ex-president's men are already doing Putin's work.
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