THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday wrapped up participation in the annual NATO summit facing an alliance that had largely bent to his will.
Far from the tense meetings of Trump's first term, much of the annual summit in The Hague seemed catered to the impulses and worldviews of the Republican president whose “America First” foreign policy ethos downplays the importance and influence of multilateral coalitions.
After less than 24 hours on the ground in the Netherlands, Trump headed back to Washington having secured a major policy change he's pushed for since 2017: a significant boost in defense spending by other NATO countries whom the president has for years accused of freeloading off the United States. The focus on Ukraine was scaled back dramatically, with its invasion by Russia earning only a passing mention in the summit's official statement, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's profile at the gathering diminished.
Trump also sent NATO scattering for reassurances that the United States would remain committed to the alliance's mutual defense pledge, affirming on Wednesday that he would abide by Article 5 of the NATO treaty just a day after he rattled the 32-nation alliance by being equivocal about the pact.
“I stand with it. That’s why I’m here," Trump said when asked to clarify his stance on Article 5. "If I didn’t stand with it, I wouldn’t be here.”
Trump shifts his tone on NATO
At a news conference later Wednesday, Trump sounded reflective as he described feeling inspired by other NATO countries that were motivated to provide for their own defense by bolstering their own spending.
“They want to protect their country, and they need the United States, and without the United States, it’s not going to be the same,” Trump said, later adding: “I left here differently. I -- I left here saying, ‘These people really love their countries. It’s not a rip-off.’ And we are here to help them protect their country.”
He had mused just a day earlier that whether he abides by the treaty “depends on your definition” of Article 5.
The mutual praise in The Hague on Wednesday stands in stark contrast to Trump's previous harsh words for the alliance, whose value he had long questioned. It also reflects the efforts made by other world leaders during the early months of Trump's second term to approach the mercurial president using his own language of superlatives and flattery.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer showed up to the Oval Office in February to hand-deliver an invitation from King Charles III for a second state visit, which Starmer called “unprecedented.” Italy’s Giorgia Meloni has promised to “make the West great again,” echoing Trump’s campaign slogan. NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte wrote in a message to “Mr. President, dear Donald” that his push for increased alliance defense spending would help “achieve something NO American president in decades could get done.”
Trump gets a win on spending increase
The 32 leaders endorsed a final summit statement saying: “Allies commit to invest 5% of GDP annually on core defense requirements as well as defense- and security-related spending by 2035 to ensure our individual and collective obligations.”
“I've been asking them to go up to 5% for a number of years,” Trump said earlier in the day as he met with Rutte, whose private message of praise the U.S. president posted on his Truth Social account.
Spain had already officially announced that it cannot meet the target, and others have voiced reservations. Trump sounded peeved by Spain's decision and said he'd have the country make up for it by paying higher tariffs to the United States as part of a trade deal.
Spain belongs to the European Union, the world’s largest trading bloc, which negotiates trade deals on behalf of all 27 member countries. They are not meant to negotiate trade deals individually.
NATO members took pains to be solicitious of Trump
Trump's turn at this year's summit came eight years after his NATO debut in 2017, a gathering that was perhaps most remembered by his shove of Dusko Markovic, the prime minister of Montenegro, as the U.S. president jostled toward the front of the pack of world leaders during a NATO headquarters tour.
But the atmosphere around Trump this week seemed far chummier than in past years.
The president was offered — and accepted — the chance to sleep Tuesday night at the Dutch royal palace. King Willem-Alexander and Queen Maxima, Trump said, were “beautiful people, great people, big, beautiful heart.”
Meanwhile, Rutte referred to Trump as a “daddy" who “has to sometimes use strong language” to stop a conflict between two warring entities — an analogy that the secretary-general used on the war between Israel and Iran.
“Doesn't he deserve some praise?" Rutte said later at his own news conference when asked whether his use of “daddy” for Trump made him appear weak.
Few may have gone as far as Rutte, who has maintained a good relationship with Trump since the U.S. president returned to office, but other world leaders have found different ways to flatter Trump.
Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda, as he advocated for the increase in defense spending by NATO allies, riffed on Trump's campaign rally cry. “We should choose a motto: ‘Make NATO great again,’” he said.
Asked about Rutte’s behavior toward Trump, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said, “I didn’t find it obsequious."
“I expressed it a bit more soberly in my words, but of course it is and remains true that it was only this U.S. administration — in combination with the war in Ukraine — that prompted us to decide what we decided today," said Merz.
Trump administration lashes out at reporting on strike effectiveness
The Israel-Iran war and the recent U.S. strikes against three Iranian nuclear facilities hung heavily over this year's gathering. After Trump arrived in the Netherlands on Tuesday, The Associated Press and other news outlets reported that a U.S. intelligence report suggested in an early assessment that Iran's nuclear program had been set back only a few months by weekend strikes and was not “completely and fully obliterated,” as Trump had said.
But on Wednesday morning, Trump and other senior Cabinet officials vigorously pushed back on the assessment, and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the administration was launching an investigation into who disclosed those findings to reporters.
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This story has been corrected to show Trump stayed at the Dutch king’s palace, not the Danish king’s palace.
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Superville reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Laurie Kellman in London, Geir Moulson in Berlin and Mike Corder in The Hague contributed to this report.
Seung Min Kim And Darlene Superville, The Associated Press
