Trump Weighs Pulling U.S. Out Of NATO --- Iran war tensions threaten to break up alliance that has long been a bulwark

 

“WASHINGTON -- President Trump has raised with his advisers the possibility of withdrawing from NATO if allies don't help reopen the Strait of Hormuz, U.S. officials said, as growing tensions with Europeans threaten the alliance that has been the foundation of the post-World War II order.

 

He hasn't explicitly given an order to pull the U.S. out of the alliance that has stood for more than three-quarters of a century, the officials said. But they said that Trump has discussed leaving NATO or potentially finding ways to weaken the U.S. commitment to the organization. Trump has made no final decision about the future of the U.S. role in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the officials said.

 

Trump's comments, made recently to Secretary of State Marco Rubio and others in private conversations, come as he urges Europeans to pry open the Strait of Hormuz so the U.S. can end its military campaign against Iran. He has railed against NATO for not joining U.S.-Israeli military efforts against Iran.

 

A law passed by Congress in 2023 prohibits a president from unilaterally withdrawing the U.S. from NATO. Doing so requires a two-thirds vote in the Senate or a joint act of Congress. Rubio championed the legislation when he was in the Senate.

 

When asked about Trump's private comments, White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said "President Trump has made his disappointment with NATO and other allies clear, and as the president emphasized, 'the United States will remember.'"

 

The State Department and NATO declined to comment.

 

In a national address on the course of the war Wednesday night, Trump said the Strait of Hormuz would "open up naturally" once the war ended. He threatened that if Iran doesn't reach a deal with the U.S., America would carry out strikes on the country's power plants.

 

He said earlier that Iran had asked for a cease-fire, a request that Tehran denied making.

 

NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte will travel to Washington next week and meet with Trump, a White House official and people familiar with the situation said. The visit was long planned, a NATO spokeswoman said.

 

Trump's conversations about the U.S. role in NATO come as European leaders have hardened their stances toward Trump. Polls show the Iran war is deeply unpopular among European voters. Even leaders who were once considered among his closest allies have expressed growing frustration with him over the Iran conflict and his demands.

 

Chancellor Friedrich Merz of Germany, who once boasted about his close relationship with Trump, said last week that he had firmly rejected the president's demand to help open the strait in a phone call between the two leaders. He said the way the U.S. president was speaking about Germany and Europe was unacceptable.

 

"I told him, if you wanted our help, you should have asked earlier instead of going to the newspapers now," Merz said.

 

Trump and others in his administration have been publicly airing their frustrations with NATO allies. Trump told a British newspaper, the Telegraph, in an interview that he was strongly considering pulling the U.S. out of NATO.

 

On Fox News Tuesday, Rubio signaled that after the war, Trump would rethink whether the U.S. should remain in NATO. "Unfortunately, after this conflict has concluded, we are going to have to re-examine that relationship, we are going to have to re-examine the value of NATO and that alliance for our country," he said.

 

A Merz spokesman said that Germany hadn't received any internal signals that a big shift was coming, dismissing Trump's rhetoric as a tactic to raise pressure on allies.

 

Any move by NATO's strongest country to leave the alliance or downgrade its relationship to the other 31 member states would deal the biggest-ever blow to the bloc. It would shake the foundation of the post-World War II order and escalate the crisis between the U.S. and Europe amid events in Ukraine and Trump's efforts to seize Greenland from Denmark, a NATO ally.

 

It would also significantly hinder the U.S. ability to carry out operations in the Middle East, given how U.S. bases in Europe provide logistical and supply hubs for the missions.

 

European military and political leaders have long said NATO's deterrence is based not only on its warfighting capacity, but also above all on the belief by allies and adversaries alike that the alliance would stand as one if challenged.

 

"NATO is like a religion -- you either believe it works, or you don't, and now we have reached a stage where everyone on both sides of the Atlantic has lost their faith completely," said Ivan Krastev, a fellow with the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna.

 

Trump's ire rose after Spain closed its airspace to U.S. planes involved in the Iran war, while France reportedly blocked Israeli planes from flying weapons it needed to restock through its airspace.” [1]

 

To prevent Jews from Israel from returning to back Poland, Israel and its lobbyists need the EU to tremble before Iranian drones, just as Israel is now trembling. The EU is avoiding this state of constant war. 

 

1. Trump Weighs Pulling U.S. Out Of NATO --- Iran war tensions threaten to break up alliance that has long been a bulwark. Ward, Alexander; Gramer, Robbie; Pancevski, Bojan.  Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y.. 02 Apr 2026: A1.