This week’s NATO summit in Ankara arrives at a fraught moment: Even as America and its allies face growing threats from authoritarian powers, differences over Ukraine, Iran, Greenland and US military commitments in Europe have strained transatlantic ties.
That gives President Donald Trump and Secretary General Mark Rutte a golden opportunity to put NATO on the right path.
Their first order of business must be spurring further European investment in defense.
At last year’s summit, allies committed to allocate 5% of GDP to defense and other security-related priorities by 2035 — a historic decision for which Trump deserves much credit.
Some countries, such as Poland and the Baltic states, are already there.
Germany, the industrial workhorse of Europe, has begun ramping up spending to correct decades of underinvestment, aiming to become the continent’s strongest conventional force next decade.
Yet others, like the UK, are moving in the right direction — but much more slowly.
In Ankara, Trump should lavish praise upon the high achievers while pushing the laggards to pick up the pace.
The trick is to dish out this tough love without undermining the alliance’s credibility.
Trump should emphasize that he seeks not to disengage from Europe, but to strengthen NATO through proper burden-sharing.
The allies now understand that Washington expects Europe to “take primary responsibility for its own conventional defense,” as the Pentagon’s 2026 National Defense Strategy declared in January.
But getting there will require a generational effort.
This transition was never going to be easy, but it doesn’t have to be chaotic.
Trump and Rutte therefore should publicly commit to develop — and then stick to — a reasonable NATO transition framework.
Allies should never be blindsided by US decisions — as they were in May, when the Pentagon suddenly canceled an Armored Brigade Combat Team’s rotational deployment to Poland, sparking widespread concern.
That should have been a lesson: Withdrawing US capabilities before the Europeans can replace them risks inviting Russian aggression.
The alliance must set realistic timetables for handing Europe specific defense responsibilities, decide which functions should remain America’s bailiwick and establish an agreed floor for a permanent US posture in Europe.
The US Army’s current forward presence in Eastern Europe, for example, deserves immediate attention.
Confusion over the Combat Team’s canceled deployment to “model ally” Poland — which Trump sought to soothe by declaring that he’d send 5,000 additional troops there on an unspecified timeframe — still linger.
The administration has since said that Washington is planning to shift some forward-stationed forces from Germany to Poland, following a broad six-month Pentagon review of US force posture and basing in Europe.
But building the infrastructure to house those troops and their families will likely take years — leaving our eastern-flank allies in the lurch in the meantime.
As an interim solution, Trump should direct the Pentagon to resume the rotational ABCT deployments.
These forces, which aren’t needed in the Pacific, would bolster deterrence of Russia — and prove to the Europeans that Washington rewards allies who step up.
Trump should also use the gathering to put Russia on notice: Vladimir Putin no longer “has the cards” in Ukraine.
Ukrainian forces have gained some momentum on the battlefield — and Trump has publicly taken note.
Russian territorial advances have grown even slower and more casualty-intensive, and Ukraine has even managed to claw back a little land.
The Ukrainian army has stopped bleeding manpower, while the European Union has put Kyiv’s finances on a sustainable footing.
Kyiv has expanded its advantage in drone warfare, improved its command-and-control through newly established army corps, and developed successful counters to Russian tactical adaptations.
Meanwhile, Ukraine is pressuring Russian logistics using “middle strike” drones while pounding energy infrastructure and defense-industrial plants deep in the rear, resulting in a worsening domestic fuel crisis.
Russia’s prospects of achieving even Putin’s minimal objective of seizing the rest of eastern Ukraine’s Donbas region look increasingly dim.
Yet Putin continues to condition peace on maximalist demands that outstrip his military leverage.
In Ankara, Trump should emphasize that if peace is to be achieved, Moscow must bring its negotiating terms in line with battlefield reality.
Until then, he should tighten sanctions on Russia’s energy and financial sectors and work with allies to reinforce Ukraine’s long-range strike and air defense capabilities.
This summit can set NATO up for long-term success — and cement Trump’s legacy as the president who got Europe to heed America’s call for partners willing to put skin in the game.
For all its flaws, NATO remains the most successful military alliance in history, and one of America’s greatest strategic assets.
With the right combination of unity and tough love, Trump can ensure that NATO leaves Ankara stronger than it arrived.
Mark Montgomery, a retired US Navy rear admiral, is a senior director at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, where John Hardie is deputy director of the Russia program.
This story originally appeared on NYPost
