President Donald Trump said Tuesday NATO and most other allies have rejected his calls to help secure the Strait of Hormuz, grousing that he has been unable to rally support behind his war of choice in Iran that he insists he’s conducting for the good of the world, even if it doesn’t appreciate his effort.Trump, who has been pressing allies to help safeguard the critical waterway to ease a chokepoint on the region’s oil exports, fumed that the US is not getting support “despite the fact that we helped” NATO “so much,” and said that it was in allies’ interest to prevent Iran from securing a nuclear weapon.
Trump’s indignant response to allies’ refusal to get involved in the war underscored that the conflict — now in its third week and causing reverberations across the global economy — is one the international community is looking to the US leader to sort out himself after he launched it without consultation.”You would have thought they would have said, ‘We’d love to send a couple of minesweepers.’ That’s not a big deal,” Trump said. “It doesn’t cost very much money. But they didn’t do that.”While he expressed resentment at traditional US allies, Trump insisted he’s OK with the solidifying dynamic of the conflict, which, for better or worse, will rest largely on his shoulders alone.
While Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had been urging him on this path for months, Trump has increasingly made the case that the road to conflict was chosen by one man. It started based on what Trump described as a “feeling” about the threat posed by Iran, and he has said it will end when his gut says it’s time.”We don’t need any help, actually,” Trump told reporters as he hosted Ireland’s Prime Minister Micheál Martin for a St. Patrick’s Day visit to the White House.Trump complained that NATO allies have counted on tens of billions of dollars in US backing for Ukraine to fend off Russia’s invasion, but could not return the favor to help the US and Israel in its efforts to defang Iran, which has posed a threat to the Middle East and beyond for years. The US, he added, has spent hundreds of billions fortifying Europe and Asian defenses.
Leave a Reply