NATO putting best foot forward for summit, Trump

President Donald Trump salutes a Belgian soldier Wednesday as he and his wife, Melania, arrive at Meisbroek Military Airport in Belgium. At right is Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel. Trump will meet with NATO allies today.
President Donald Trump salutes a Belgian soldier Wednesday as he and his wife, Melania, arrive at Meisbroek Military Airport in Belgium. At right is Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel. Trump will meet with NATO allies today.

BRUSSELS -- Not only is NATO rolling out the red carpet for President Donald Trump in Brussels today, but the military alliance that Trump once declared obsolete has also been busy revising its image and is ready to unveil a new $1.1 billion headquarters.

In recent months, member nations have worked to show that they are ramping up defense spending as Trump has demanded, even though they have been doing so for a few years in response to an aggressive Russia.

And while they agree with the president of the alliance's most powerful member that NATO can do more to fight terrorism, they say it can be achieved with more of the same: training and mentoring troops in Afghanistan, and equipping local forces in Iraq so they can better fight the Islamic State extremist group themselves.

The NATO leaders plan to agree in meetings this week to join the 68-nation international coalition fighting the Islamic State, since Germany and France no longer plan to raise any objections about announcing the decision today.

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Also, an anti-terror coordinator may be named, but most NATO changes will be cosmetic. The allies have no intention of going to war against the Islamic State.

"It's totally out of the question for NATO to engage in any combat operations," NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Wednesday, on the eve of today's meeting.

The 28 member nations, plus soon-to-join Montenegro, will renew an old vow to move toward spending 2 percent of their gross domestic product on defense by 2024. Still, many are skeptical about that arbitrary bottom line. Germany would have to virtually double its military budget and spend more than Russia.

Putting some meat in the pledge, the leaders plan to agree to prepare action plans by the end of the year on how to reach 2 percent over the next seven years, and show how they will use the money and contribute troops to NATO operations.

Only five members currently meet the target: the United Kingdom, Estonia, debt-laden Greece, Poland and the United States, which spends more on defense than all the other allies combined.

Tomas Valasek from the Carnegie Europe think tank said the U.S. president's demands regarding overdue spending have shaken up the other allies.

"Trump has challenged the idea that active engagement in Europe is a core U.S. interest," Valasek said. "He appears to regard all foreign relations as zero-sum transactions, in which each contribution to someone else's security represents a net loss to the United States."

The Europeans, Valasek said, should respond in two ways: "In the short term, focus on preventing the president from abandoning the alliance and, in the long term, prepare to assume a bigger role in defending the European continent."

The short working-dinner meeting will be high on symbolism. At the entry to the new premises -- a village-sized complex that should be in full use early next year -- Trump and Stoltenberg will unveil a piece of the World Trade Center.

After the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks in the United States, NATO activated its collective defense clause for the first and only time, with member nations pledging to help their beleaguered ally.

Stoltenberg and German Chancellor Angela Merkel will also unveil a part of the Berlin Wall that once divided East and West Germany.

But the ceremonies and symbolism will do little to hide the divisions running through NATO. Trump wants more from the alliance, while countries such as Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia want ironclad assurances that they won't be left alone should Russia cross their borders.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, meanwhile, has purged about 11,000 military personnel from Turkey's armed forces since July's thwarted coup. Hundreds of Western-educated senior officers were removed from posts at NATO, severely weakening the army.

Yet that's a subject that is almost taboo at NATO headquarters; a national affair to be dealt with internally.

Tensions have also mounted between Erdogan and Merkel since Germany offered asylum to some of the Turkish officers. Belgium has publicly warned against any pro-Erdogan rallies during his visit.

Outside the heavily guarded security perimeter near the city's airport and in downtown Brussels, peace groups have planned rallies.

Belgium will remain on security Level 3 -- meaning that the threat of an extremist attack "is possible and likely" -- as it has since the suicide-bomb attacks on the Brussels airport and subway killed 32 people last year.

Information for this article was contributed by Raf Casert of The Associated Press.

A Section on 05/25/2017

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