In Trump’s drive for Greenland, NATO is the first casualty

A few months ago, officials on both sides of the Atlantic hoped that they had saved the Western alliance —the world’s biggest economic and military community.

- Marcus Walker & Daniel Michaels

Today, the team that won the Cold War handled the globe is in tatters.

President Trump’s threat to impose tariffs on European allies that resist a full U.S. takeover of the Danish territory of Greenland has fused two areas of trans-Atlantic tension—trade and security—into an explosive cocktail that is plunging the alliance into its deepest crisis in over 70 years.

"World Peace is at stake!" Trump posted on Truth Social, saying that China and Russia would take over Greenland unless the U.S. did.

He attacked European members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization for sending military personnel to the territory at Denmark's invitation, saying that only the U.S. could secure the island. Then came the threat of escalating tariffs until they agreed to the U.S. owning Greenland.

Trump's economic threat and dismissal of allies’ usefulness have added to the sense of shock across Europe, where governments are reeling from the unprecedented outbursts of U.S. hostility since Trump returned to the White House a year ago.

NATO, which was founded on a sense of a common destiny among Western democracies, has relied as much on trust and political cohesion as on its military infrastructure.

The belief that the U.S. was deeply committed to its European allies and would defend them against an attack has been the foundation of NATO's credibility and its power to deter enemies.

That trust and commitment are now in serious doubt. Many veterans of the alliance on both sides of the Atlantic wonder if it can recover.

“The organization will survive, but the trust—the glue that has held it together for over 75 years—has been shattered, so it will not be effective,” said Doug Lute, a retired U.S. Army lieutenant general and former U.S. ambassador to NATO.

Deferential displays