The Version of Trump NATO Fears Most

From CNN's Freeed's Global Briefing - Tuesday, July 10, 2018

There are three versions of President Trump that could show up to the NATO summit that begins Wednesday in Belgium, The Economistwrites: triumphant, tetchy or torpedo. It’s the last one that would really keep Europe’s leaders awake at night. “NATO’s nightmare is that a frustrated Mr Trump openly questions America’s commitment to Article 5, the alliance’s mutual-defense clause, under which an attack on one member is viewed as an attack on all,” The Economist argues. “He might, for example, tell the allies that they can’t count on Article 5 unless they hit the defense-spending target of 2% of GDP. Having thus shaken the foundations of the alliance’s collective defense, a few days later the president proceeds to embrace President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, and agrees to cut back on ‘expensive’ troop deployments in Europe and ‘provocative’ missile defenses. In other words, the sequence becomes a replay of the G7 falling-out followed by the embrace of Kim Jong Un of North Korea.”