By Harsh V Pant & Vivek Mishra

For anyone who is piqued by US President Donald Trump’s deceptive diplomacy, where ‘strategic ambiguity’ is a policy choice, his volte face on North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) offers key insights. During the recently-held NATO summit in The Hague, perhaps the biggest development was Trump’s metamorphosed views that NATO remains relevant for the US. A strong signal from the NATO countries that its European members have reached a near unison on spending close to 5% of their GDP on defence, compelling a change of heart in Trump. In what has been seen as very encouraging by member countries, Trump referred to NATO as not a ‘rip off’ anymore and reaffirmed US’ commitment to it. These developments provided a positive appraisal of the transatlantic relations, especially against the stark background of a consistent broadside since the beginning of the second Trump administration, inflected by Vice President JD Vance’s Munich Security Conference speech earlier this year. Whether this sentiment from the Oval Office will remain consistent for the remainder of Trump’s term may be anyone’s guess but the Hague summit’s new promise on burden sharing across the Atlantic is historic and marks a new era in NATO’s  evolution as a leading collective security organisation. 

The Hague defence commitment this year promises to increase defence spending by NATO member countries to 5% of GDP by 2035, out of which 3.5% will be allocated to core defence needs and the rest to related aspects of security such as infrastructure, intelligence, cybersecurity, etc. By the end of this year, NATO expects all allies........

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