NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte played to U.S. President Donald Trump\u2019s love of praise and splashy visuals during a visit to Washington that was aimed at easing the U.S. leader\u2019s anger over alliance nations\u2019 reluctance to help with the campaign against Iran.<\/p>\n
Meeting Trump in the Oval Office, Rutte displayed posters that featured gold lettering and bright red bar charts labeled \u201cThe Trump Trillion\u201d and \u201cThe Trump 47 Effect.\u201d They highlighted how much more money NATO nations have spent on defense since Trump first took office in 2017.<\/p>\n
\u201cI go over to these boards here because I want to show you what this president is able to achieve,\u201d Rutte said. European nations matching the U.S. on defense spending was something that hadn\u2019t been achieved since the administration of Dwight Eisenhower in the 1950s, he said.<\/p>\n
The visit saw Rutte in hard-sell mode and playing on his warm relationship even as Trump has turned on the alliance. Rutte, who once hailed Trump as NATO\u2019s \u201cdaddy,\u201d has faced blowback in Europe for what some allies see as a too-deferential approach to the president.<\/p>\n
Trump appeared mostly unmoved by the appeal, though he gave no indication that he\u2019s preparing to downgrade relations with the alliance or take other punitive action. He praised Rutte while reiterating his disappointment with European allies for balking at allowing the U.S. to use their bases as part of the campaign against Iran.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were disappointed with the U.K., we were disappointed with Germany and France,\u201d Trump said. \u201cBut I have great respect for this man and so we\u2019re going to be discussing what took place.\u201d<\/p>\n
When Rutte mentioned that there were still ongoing \u201cdebates\u201d about whether European allies were standing with the U.S., Trump cut him off, saying \u201cthey weren\u2019t.\u201d He slapped the secretary-general on the knee.<\/p>\n
The NATO chief\u2019s visit comes at a delicate moment for the alliance with the Iran war inflaming already simmering tensions between Washington and its allies. Trump has also bristled at criticism over the war and the allies\u2019 refusal to try to reopen the Strait of Hormuz by force.<\/p>\n
\u201cEuropean allies have been there,\u201d Rutte told Trump, citing what he said were 4,000 to 5,000 U.S. flights from military bases. He hailed Trump as the \u201cleader of the free world.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI really want to make clear how important it is what you are doing on Iran,\u201d Rutte said.<\/p>\n
While Rutte has been able to calm earlier flare-ups with Washington, including over defense spending and when Trump threatened to seize Greenland, the strains from the Iran war may be more difficult to resolve. The Trump administration has warned it may draw down troops from Europe.<\/p>\n
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth assailed allies…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte played to U.S. President Donald Trump\u2019s love of praise and splashy visuals during a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":176424,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3],"tags":[38,34,2245,1486,683],"class_list":["post-176423","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-iran","tag-donald-trump","tag-iran","tag-mark-rutte","tag-nato","tag-u-s"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116808356151568088","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176423","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=176423"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176423\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/176424"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=176423"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=176423"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=176423"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}