NATO’s ability to deter Russia takes hit with trans-Atlantic infighting

BRUSSELS: European allies and Canada are pouring billions of dollars into helping Ukraine, and they have pledged to massively boost their budgets to defend their territories.

But despite those efforts, NATO’s credibility as a unified force under US leadership has taken a huge hit over the past year as trust within the 32-nation military organisation dissolved.

The rift has been most glaring over US President Donald Trump’s repeated threats to seize Greenland, a semiautonomous territory of NATO ally Denmark. More recently, Trump’s disparaging remarks about his NATO allies’

troops in Afghanistan drew another outcry. While the

heat on Greenland has subsided for now, the infighting has seriously undercut the ability of the world’s biggest security alliance to deter adversaries, analysts say.

“The episode matters because it crossed a line that cannot be uncrossed,” Sophia Besch from the Carnegie Europe think tank said in a report on the Greenland crisis. “Even without force or sanctions, that breach weakens the alliance in a lasting way.”

The tensions haven’t gone unnoticed in Russia, NATO’s biggest threat. Any deterrence of Russia relies on ensuring that President Vladimir Putin is convinced that NATO will retaliate should he expand his war beyond Ukraine. Right now, that does not seem to be the case.