NATO’s secretary general is downplaying the threat of a trade war between the United States and Canada — two founding members of the Western military alliance — as a dispute that could be managed.
Mark Rutte, the former prime minister of the Netherlands who was appointed to the top allied political post last fall, spoke Monday in Brussels alongside British Prime Minister Keir Starmer following a meeting between the two.
“I am absolutely convinced that we can deal with these issues, and there are always issues between allies,” Rutte said during a joint news conference.
“There are always issues, sometimes bigger, sometimes smaller. But I’m absolutely convinced that will not get in the way of our collective determination to keep our deterrence strong.”
NATO secretary general Mark Rutte, was asked in Brussels on Monday about issues among NATO allies — including tariff issues between Canada and the U.S. , as well as strained ties between Denmark and the U.S. over Greenland. Rutte said it’s a ‘silly thought’ to think you could run the trans-Atlantic defence organization without the U.S.
For an alliance that prides itself on presenting a united front to Russia, the last few days — even the last few weeks — haven’t been kind.
U.S. President Donald Trump ordered the imposition of a 25 per cent tariff on Canadian goods over the weekend and has suggested he’d use “economic force” to absorb Canada as part of the union. On Monday, he kept up the annexation rhetoric.
“Look what I’d like to see is Canada become our 51st state,” he told reporters in the Oval Office.
“Some people say that would be a long shot. If people wanted to play the game right, it would be 100 per cent certain they would become a state.”
The threat of tariffs was pushed off for 30 days on Monday as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Trump agreed on a series of border measures intended to mitigate American concerns about the flow of illegal migrants and fentanyl.
Separately, prior to his second-term inauguration, Trump resurrected a desire from his first term in office to annex Greenland, a frozen, semi-autonomous island in the North American Arctic that belongs to Denmark. The president recently spoke with the Danish prime minister and even Trump himself conceded the conversation went badly.
The president has also threatened to impose tariffs on European countries.
Encouraging attacks on allies
While running for office almost a year ago, Trump launched a broadside against allies who don’t meet NATO’s two per cent of gross domestic product spending benchmark, saying he would “encourage” Russia to attack members that had not met their financial obligations. Later in the campaign, he described the remark as a form of negotiation to get allies to pony up.
Canada is among those countries that — despite the political hectoring — does not meet the goal. A promise to attain it by 2032 was a last-minute decision at the Washington Summit in July, and Canada is now working to accelerate its timeline.
Trump has a long history of complaining about NATO, accusing members of not pulling their weight on military spending and overall taking for granted that they can rely on the United States for their defence.
On Monday, Rutte said any notion of a European defence strategy without the United States would be a “silly thought.”
Steve Saideman, a political scientist who holds the Paterson Chair in International Affairs at Carleton University, said he believes the trade war between the U.S. and Canada will have a profound impact on allies.
“They’ll be waiting for their turn,” said Saideman.
“If the United States is willing to cut off its own arm to spew venom towards Canada, then what will it do to countries that it has less dependence upon?”
The fact the Trump administration is targeting Canada and Denmark is also significant because both countries were “willing to bleed for the United States in Afghanistan,” he said.
If Washington bullies those countries, Saideman said, it becomes harder for them to follow the lead of the United States in the future.
Much of what’s unfolding is without precedent and Saideman is admittedly pessimistic about the future of NATO, which recently expanded to include Finland and Sweden.
He can now envision the United States not coming to the aid of its allies — or withdrawing outright.
Saideman said he “never thought NATO would end this way.”
There are winners with all of this dissension, he added.
“The traditional adversaries of the United States are very, very happy at this moment,” he said.
“They’re not sure exactly which threats will be followed through on, but Iran, North Korea, Russia, China, this is all great, great news for them. Because division amongst the Western countries is what they want, and Trump is giving it to them on a platter.”
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