Norway’s own Jens Stoltenberg, the former highly acclaimed NATO boss, went on national TV in his homeland Wednesday night and reassured Norwegians nervous over the future of the defense alliance. Membership will likely become even more expensive for European allies, but Stoltenberg thinks the US will continue to be “a strong NATO ally” also after Donald Trump takes over as US president again in January.
Few commanded as much respect, or got along as well with Donald Trump, as Stoltenberg did during his tenure as NATO’s secretary general. The former Norwegian prime minister has a talent for impressing and even charming most of those he meets, and Trump posed a major challenge after he was first elected as US president in 2016.
Trump quickly made it clear that he didn’t think European allies were paying for enough of NATO’s expenses. Even though NATO members had earlier agreed to spend at least 2 percent of their GNP on their own defense, few were meeting the goal.
Now most all are including Norway, after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 shocked them into putting defense at the top of national agendas. Stoltenberg also prodded them along, and by the time he stepped down this autumn after a record 10 years in the post, NATO’s European members’ contributions had increased significantly.
Now Trump is poised for a return to the White House, after winning Tuesday’s US presidential election. That worries many for various reasons, but Stoltenberg said on NRK’s national news program Dagsrevyen that he thinks Trump “will stand by NATO.”
Stoltenberg, who’s about to take over as leader of the Munich Security Conference, had congratulated Trump earlier in the day, and received a reply in which Trump thanked Stoltenberg for his support. Stoltenberg had stated that his “working relationship” with Trump during his first term as US president “focused on bolstering trans-Atlantic security and adapting NATO for the future. In a world of growing instability, strong US leadership remains essential.”
That apparently resounded with Trump in his acknowledgment of Stoltenberg’s congratulatory greeting. Stoltenberg told NRK that it was “an important way to establish contact from all Europeans, to see how you can get the best results even though there’s political disagreement between him (Trump) and many European governments.”
Asked whether there was reason for all the concern about the future of NATO with Trump as US president again, Stoltenberg said that “we have no guarantees in democracies, and there will be some disagreement and proposals that folks will raise questions about.”
He added, though, that “fundamentally I think the USA, also under the new president, will be a strong NATO ally.”
Stoltenberg told NRK that it also will be part of his new job as leader of the Munich Security Conference to have contact with its American delegation. That may include contact with Trump as well.
Now it will be up to Stoltenberg’s successor, the former Dutch politician and prime minister Mark Rutte, to deal with Trump and his new administration that will take over in January. Rutte has already pledged to keep NATO strong and secure an efficient defense against any threat. Rutte also aims to not only continue Stoltenberg’s strong support for Ukraine, but boost it, along with strengthening NATO’s partnerships with both the EU and the Pacific region. Australia, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand already take part regularly in NATO summits.
Rutte also wants China to stop supporting Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “war machine,” arguing at his first press conference after taking over on October 1 that “China can’t continue” to fuel the biggest conflict in Europe since World War II without it having consequences on the country’s interests and reputation.” Trump is known for not being a great fan of China, either.
It remains unclear how Trump thinks, as he’s stated, that it will take him just a day to end the war in Ukraine. “No one knows knows with certainty” what Trump is thinking, Stoltenberg told NRK. “It’s important that European allies spend time with the new administration in the USA, when it comes to the war in Ukraine,” especially since it now also involves soldiers from North Korea, drones and weapons from Iran and China’s support for the Russian economy.
“If Ukraine loses the war, there won’t be peace,” Stoltenberg noted. “It will be an occupation. So the challenge is to convince Putin that he can’t win, and then ongoing military support for Ukraine is the way forward.” European allies also may need to provide even more defense support than they already are, he added, especially if Trump offers less.
Stoltenberg, meanwhile, said he thinks “it can go well” with Trump as US president again. “It’s all about engaging and not creating self-fulfilling prophecies,” he said. Trump’s greatest strength, Stoltenberg said, is that he sticks with his message: “He says the same things over and over again, and I think that strengthens political debate.”
Stoltenberg also made a point, while on a visit to Washington DC last winter, to devote time to a conservative think-tank that has its own controversial plan for a new Trump administration. He not only visited but spoke at a session of The Heritage Foundation, driving home the message that the world is in “a dangerous time” that needs NATO more than ever. Trump told newspaper Aftenposten at the time that he felt it was “important to reach out to the Republican milieu in the USA, also the conservative Republicn milieu.”
Stoltenberg, who’s writing a book about his decade leading NATO, further noted that “it’s in the USA’s interests to have a strong NATO. The USA becomes stronger with more than 30 friends.” There’s also broad bipartisan support in the US for NATO, also in the new US Congress that’s heavily Republican like Trump.
Most important, perhaps, is that Trump’s earlier criticism wasn’t against NATO, but against the lack of funding for it from European members. “That has changed dramatically,” Stoltenberg said. He warned that Trump now may demand more than the 2 percent goal that’s widely been reached.
“I don’t think he’ll be satisfied with 2 percent,” Stoltenberg told NRK. “There will come demands for even more, but that’s a much better starting point than we had in 2016.”
NewsinEnglish.no/Nina Berglund
