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“You’ll have to start learning how to fight for yourself, the U.S.A. won’t be there to help you anymore, just like you weren’t there for us,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
The dispute strikes at NATO’s core principle of collective defense under Article 5, which declares an attack on one member is an attack on all. In NATO’s history, this clause has only been activated once, after the September 11 attacks, prompting allied troops to join the U.S. in Afghanistan, where over 1,100 non-American service members lost their lives.
Trump, however, has consistently questioned whether NATO allies would reciprocate in a crisis. He has repeatedly claimed that NATO forces held back in Afghanistan and has maintained pressure amid the ongoing Iran conflict, which flared on February 28.
“Beyond not being there, it was actually hard to believe. And I didn’t do a big sale. I just said, ‘Hey,’ you know, I didn’t insist too much. I just think it should be automatic,” Trump told The Telegraph.
He continued, highlighting U.S. involvement in Ukraine as an example of automatic support:
“We’ve been there automatically, including Ukraine,” he said. “Ukraine wasn’t our problem. It was a test, and we were there for them, and we would always have been there for them. They weren’t there for us.”
While the U.S. has supplied intelligence and allowed European nations to purchase American arms for Kyiv, no fresh aid package has been greenlit under the Biden administration.
Trump also took aim at British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, criticizing London for initially denying U.S. forces access to British bases for potential strikes on Iran due to legal concerns. Britain later contributed to defensive measures after its own assets were attacked in the region.
In the same interview, Trump didn’t spare the UK’s military, mocking its capabilities.
“You don’t even have a navy. You’re too old and had aircraft carriers that didn’t work.”
Trump further criticized Starmer’s domestic priorities:
“I’m not going to tell him what to do. He can do whatever he wants. It doesn’t matter. All Starmer wants is costly windmills that are driving your energy prices through the roof.”
Starmer responded by defending NATO’s relevance, calling it “the single most effective military alliance the world has ever seen,” while emphasizing that Britain will not be “dragged into” the Iran war.
