BRUSSELS
European allies and Canada are pouring billions of dollars into helping Ukraine, and they have pledged to massively boost their budgets to defend their territories.
But despite those efforts, NATO’s credibility as a unified force under U.S. leadership has taken a huge hit over the past year as trust within the 32-nation military organization dissolved.
The rift has been most glaring over U.S. President Donald Trump’s repeated threats to seize Greenland, a semiautonomous territory of NATO ally Denmark.
More recently, Trump’s disparaging remarks about his NATO allies’ troops in Afghanistan drew another outcry.
While the heat on Greenland has subsided for now, the infighting has seriously undercut the ability of the world’s biggest security alliance to deter adversaries, analysts say.
“The episode matters because it crossed a line that cannot be uncrossed,” Sophia Besch from the Carnegie Europe think tank said in a report on the Greenland crisis.
“Even without force or sanctions, that breach weakens the alliance in a lasting way.”
The tensions haven’t gone unnoticed in Russia, NATO’s biggest threat.
By James Kisoo
