Trump tests NATO clout as allies face 5% defence spending push in Ankara

Washington,UPDATED: Jul 6, 2026 10:48 IST

US President Donald Trump heads to this week’s NATO summit in Turkey seeking to make sure allies follow through on a pledge to raise defence spending to 5 per cent of their gross domestic product over the next decade. The push has become a central test of Trump’s influence over the alliance, even as he remains at odds with some members over issues ranging from the Iran war to Greenland and personal disputes with leaders.

The summit in Ankara is also expected to focus heavily on the war in Ukraine. The White House has said Trump will meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Wednesday, while he is also due to hold talks with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa on the sidelines.

Before leaving on Monday evening, Trump had been publicly complaining for days about how much the US spends on defence compared with other countries. His administration’s message ahead of the summit was laid out by US ambassador to NATO Matt Whitaker, who told reporters: "President Trump fully expects that all allies will step up immediately and get on the path to 5% and do it with urgency."

NATO secretary-general Mark Rutte had tried to underline progress during an Oval Office meeting last month, showing charts on easels about what he called "The Trump Trillion" to highlight how much allies had increased their spending commitments since 2017. Luke Coffey, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, described the Ankara summit as the "first report card" after last year’s summit in The Hague. "If NATO members play their cards right - if the leaders show up demonstrating a commitment and a reasonable plan to meet these spending targets - then it’ll allow President Trump to take a victory lap," Coffey said.

Trump arrived at the summit after leaving last month’s G7 meeting encouraged by support from other leaders for his interim agreement to end the war with Iran. He had praised the unity there, where leaders also tried to win his backing for increased security assistance to Ukraine in its war with Russia, now in its fifth year. The White House said Trump spoke with both Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin on July 4.

Trump is also expected to meet al-Sharaa, though the White House has not spelt out its goals for that discussion. The meeting comes after Trump publicly suggested Syria could play a bigger role in fighting Hezbollah in Lebanon. Al-Sharaa, who led the insurgent group whose forces ousted former Syrian President Bashar Assad, has said he has no interest in doing so.

He will separately meet Erdogan, the summit host, whom Trump considers a close friend. But no bilateral meetings have been scheduled with other leaders. Despite the relatively positive tone of the G7 summit, Trump quickly returned to attacking foreign leaders after going back to the US. He said Keir Starmer would resign as British prime minister before Starmer made it official, saying Starmer had "failed badly" on immigration and energy. Trump also said Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni had asked him for a photograph, a claim she strongly denied, leading to the cancellation of a planned US visit by Italy’s foreign minister.

Trump widened that dispute on Sunday by posting a photograph of Meloni smiling at him on social media with the words "RESTRAINING ORDER NEEDED". He has also remained on tense terms with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, while ties with French President Emmanuel Macron have not always been smooth despite a warm reception at the Palace of Versailles last month.

Against that backdrop, a bipartisan group of US senators is travelling to the summit again this year to show support for NATO in Congress and to balance Trump’s often sharp tone towards the alliance. Senator Jeanne Shaheen, who is leading the delegation, said: "They are our best allies, they are our best trading partners, they are critical to our national security, to our economic success, and we need to encourage those relationships. That’s part of what Congress understands that the administration doesn’t seem to."

The summit also comes as the Trump administration argues for what it calls "NATO 3.0", a plan under which Europe would take on more responsibility for its own security so the US could direct attention elsewhere. The strategy was outlined earlier this year by US undersecretary of defence Elbridge Colby at a meeting of NATO defence ministers.

Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth added to the pressure last month by telling NATO counterparts that the US would conduct a six-month review of its forces in Europe. That caught allies off guard because several had expected to coordinate more closely with the Trump administration during the transition. Trump also caused confusion earlier this year when he appeared to send mixed signals by saying he would send 5,000 US troops to Poland weeks after ordering the same number withdrawn from Europe.

Shaheen criticised the NATO 3.0 idea, saying it "fails to understand -- as this administration has consistently failed to understand -- the threat that Putin and Russia are to Europe and subsequently to the United States."

At last year’s summit in The Hague, Trump pushed NATO countries towards a broad goal of spending 5 per cent of GDP on defence over the next decade. Under that plan, 3.5 per cent would go to core defence spending and the rest to related areas such as infrastructure. Spain said then that it could not meet that level, while some other countries also expressed reservations about the scale of the target.

Even with higher spending promises, experts said many European countries still depend on the US for their defence if they were attacked. NATO’s core principle remains that an armed attack on one member is considered an attack on all. Liana Fix, a senior fellow for Europe at the Council on Foreign Relations, said: "This is the reality for most Europeans." She added that most were still far from being able to defend themselves without the United States, "even if they’re starting to develop all that".

NATO has also moved in other ways that suit Trump’s priorities. Earlier this year, the alliance launched "Arctic Sentry", a NATO-led military exercise aimed at countering Russian and Chinese activity in the region. The move is also seen as addressing Trump’s repeated threats to seize Greenland, after he said the US needed to acquire the semi-autonomous Danish territory for strategic security reasons.

As leaders gather in Ankara, the summit brings together several strands of Trump’s approach to NATO: pressure on allies to spend more, debate over Europe’s security role, continued reliance on the US, and wider political tensions within the alliance. The meetings with Zelenskyy, Erdogan and al-Sharaa are expected to add to the significance of a summit that will test how far NATO has moved in line with Trump’s demands.

With PTI Inputs

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