Donald Trump is set to slash the arsenal of US fighter jets, warships and submarines reserved for NATO allies should a military crisis erupt in Europe.
A military envoy sent by Pete Hegseth blindsided senior NATO officials in a classified Brussels briefing late last week, revealing US firepower committed to defending Europe will significantly decline, Der Spiegel and Reuters reported.
The US fighter jet commitment to NATO is to be slashed by a third, while the Navy will withdraw destroyers from the alliance’s pool.
Washington will also pull its submarines from the alliance altogether, envoy Alexander Velez-Green reportedly told officials behind closed doors.
Europe will be left to maintain its own supply of reconnaissance drones, a weapon that has proved decisive on the battlefields of Ukraine.
Velez-Green stressed the US is prepared to cooperate closely only with allies who move quickly to plug the gaps left by Washington’s drawdown.
Some officials in the secret meeting interpreted the message as an indirect threat, according to Der Spiegel.
The Daily Mail has contacted the White House and the Pentagon for comment.
Donald Trump is set to slash a huge arsenal of military defense reserved for NATO
Hegseth’s envoy stressed that the US is prepared to cooperate closely only with NATO partners who act quickly to close the gaps left by Washington’s scaling back of support
The Trump administration plans to pull all of its submarines reserved for NATO. US submarines are among NATO’s most critical assets in Europe because they are capable of monitoring Russia’s nuclear-armed underwater vessels
The cuts will gut the so-called ‘NATO Force Model,’ the alliance framework for defending Europe drawn up in 2022 after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
It lays out exactly which troops, jets, ships and weapons each member state must hand over to NATO’s Supreme Commander if war breaks out on the continent.
The US accounts for roughly 62 percent of total defense spending across NATO, with an annual military budget of around $980 billion.
Trump has long criticized European allies for failing to spend enough on their own militaries and for not pulling their weight in shouldering the cost of the alliance.
Earlier this month, the Pentagon announced it would draw down 5,000 troops from Germany over the next six to twelve months.
The move came after Germany’s Chancellor Friedrich Merz slammed Trump’s lack of strategy in the war against Iran.
Ahead of the meeting last week, NATO leaders were prepared for Washington to scale back support but they were reportedly blindsided by the speed of the request, according to Der Spiegel.
Hegseth’s envoy informed them that each member state is expected to bring concrete offers to a ‘Force Sourcing Conference’ in June that spell out exactly which countries will the gaps left by the US drawdown.
The US accounts for roughly 62 percent of total defense spending across NATO, with an annual military budget of around $980 billion
Europe will be responsible for maintaining its own supply of reconnaissance drones, a key weapon on the modern battlefield of Ukraine
At last June’s NATO summit in The Hague, allies bowed to Trump’s demands that they ramp up defense spending to five percent of GDP.
Adding to the mounting tensions between Europe and the US, Hegseth snubbed German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius by jetting off to a major security conference in Singapore rather than meeting his counterpart.
With Hegseth out of Washington, Pistorius scrapped the US leg of his trip altogether and is now spending five days in Canada instead.
As the US prepares to eliminate its supply of submarines to NATO, it leaves open a massive military risk for the continent if its not able to fill the gap left behind by Trump.
US submarines are among NATO’s most critical assets in Europe because they are capable of monitoring Russia’s nuclear-armed underwater vessels.
Critical infrastructure for the west, such as undersea cables and oil pipelines, are safeguarded by the submarines.
