Northantis

US withdrawing from NATO would be an act of self-harm in terms of global power projection but that's not reason for why this won't happen. Europeans need to prepare for a scenario in which the Mike Lees have majority in Congress. Just saying "Trump can't withdraw" doesn't cut it.

The United Arab Emirates are a better American ally than the United Kingdom. Think about that for a moment.

My genuine advice to the European right (such that it exists) is to lean into the anti-American sentiment. That’s your path to power. You need an ‘oppressor’ to fight against. One that moderate voters already want to hate. And the obvious rhetorical choice is America. Who’s responsible for the European migrant crisis? Not Europeans! It’s those damn Americans who caused chaos in the Middle East and forced you to accept 50M migrants (don’t worry about proving the “forced” part, people will believe it because they want to). Who’s responsible for the European energy crisis? Not Europeans! It’s those damn Americans who pushed climate change and anti-nuclear narratives to deindustrialize Europe and keep it weak and dependent (don’t worry that Russia actually funded your Green parties, it’s more fun to blame America, so people will). What about NATO? Here’s where it gets tricky, so follow along closely: America didn’t create NATO to protect you from the Soviet Union, it created NATO to keep you weak and enslave you. But also, Donald Trump wants to leave NATO because he wants to keep you weak and enslave you. Does that seem like a contradiction? It doesn’t matter. Your voters want to believe both, so they will. Ukraine War? America forced Russia’s hand. Strait of Hormuz? America closed it. Fertility crisis? America psyop’d you into thinking the world was overpopulated. It works for everything. Blame America and watch the communists and Islamists start nodding along. Blame America even harder than they do and watch your rankings shoot up in the polls. Just don’t start believing it yourselves. Never get high on your own supply. A strong, self-confident Europe is good for both Europe and America. So if you ever actually get back to that and stand up and peer out across the wide world for a friend, there across the pond, your old pal America will be waiting.

America blew up the Nordstream pipeline, and now has closed the Strait of Hormuz. Hard not to see this as a deliberate strategy of denying energy to Europe, whilst America can produce its own. Callous.

It would behoove our NATO allies to appreciate that this sentiment is *very* widely shared, including amongst erstwhile boosters of trans-Atlantic relations.

We’re in an abusive relationship with NATO Let’s leave Pass it on

SECRETARY RUBIO: Why are we in NATO? You have to ask that question. Why do we send trillions of dollars and have all of these American forces stationed in the region, if in our time of need, we won't be allowed to use those bases?

Let’s be real here. Europe has spent decades freeloading on American security. Even now, with every NATO member finally hitting the 2% GDP target in 2025. But beyond the financial contributions, the real rupture is philosophical and the Iran crisis has shown a spotlight on it. Europe worships process. Endless committees, consultations, and “predictability.” Macron actually calls it a virtue. For Trump, this is paralysis as his style is to articulate a threat, fix a target, and act. The Americans are men of conviction and purpose. Europe on the other hand lives by bureaucratic liturgy and in high-minded abstractions. Sure, Americans might make mistakes when acting. But Europe never considers what the costs of not acting actually are. Just look at how their nations are doing on various fronts, especially on the border crisis, and you see the same cancerous rot that undergirds their foreign policy approach play out domestically. It's the same problem on a different scale. Iran is currently holding the Strait of Hormuz hostage, choking 20% of global oil and spiking prices past $100 a barrel. Meanwhile, the regime is bleeding from strikes, its nuclear ambitions are still alive despite degraded capability, and its proxies are firing missiles at allies and oil tankers. If this isn’t a clear and present danger to the global economy - of which Europe is a part - then I don’t know what is. Yet when Washington asked to use European bases to finish the job - bases the US has defended for generations, the response was hesitation and hand-wringing. The US did strike from RAF Fairford, but only after warnings that British soil could become a “legitimate target.” If you cannot agree that a theocratic regime with eschatological ambitions who have shown no restraint in hitting out at Gulf countries and threatening the world’s energy jugular is an enemy worth confronting, then what, exactly, are we allies about? Europe loves to preen about being tough on Russia. They issue condemnations and speeches and slap sanctions that hardly work to cripple the Russian economy. Now here was a chance to do something concrete: let the Americans use the bases they already pay for, help clear the Strait, and actually degrade the Iranian war machine that arms Moscow’s proxies. Turmp didn’t ask for boots on the ground or any kind of more offensive action. All he wanted was permission to operate from the infrastructure America has underwritten for decades. They couldn’t even manage that. So can you blame the Americans for seeing NATO for what it is? A paper-tiger alliance that expects Washington to bleed and pay while Brussels and London convenes and deliberates. If Europe refuses to treat Iran as the threat it is while happily letting American power keep the Strait open and the lights on, then the alliance is already dead. Trump is simply stating the obvious and the Americans are becoming very reluctant to subsidize the European delusion any longer.