After two years under rhetorical assault from U.S. President Donald Trump, America's alliances have somehow held up. This year, however, the constraints on Trump's anti-alliance instincts are falling away, and a mix of internal and external pressures are endangering several key alliances at once.
This trend is most visible with respect to NATO. The trans-Atlantic alliance has been a target of Trump's ire for decades. Since taking office, he has berated European leaders, waffled on America's Article 5 commitment to protect allies, and even mused about withdrawing from the pact. Yet for two years, largely thanks to the initiative of Congress and the Pentagon, day-to-day relations with NATO remained relatively steady. The administration increased spending on military activities meant to deter Russian aggression. The alliance also took steps to improve its military readiness and address unconventional threats such as cyberattacks and information warfare.
This progress, however, was largely dependent on the presence of committed, pro-NATO officials in the American bureaucracy. Those officials are becoming scarcer by the day. Secretary of Defense James Mattis is gone, replaced by an acting secretary — Patrick Shanahan — who seems more inclined to fulfill the president's wishes. National Security Adviser John Bolton and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo are not anti-NATO, but their hostility to the European Union poisons their relationships with European colleagues. Less visibly, several key Pentagon and State Department officials responsible for the NATO portfolio — Assistant Secretary of Defense Robert Karem, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Thomas Goffus and Assistant Secretary of State Wess Mitchell — have left or will soon leave their posts.