“It was shameful.” That was how Pete Hegseth described the conduct of America’s European allies during the Iran war, in a speech to NATO defence ministers in Brussels on Thursday.
The US secretary of defence singled out Britain, saying its limits on access to UK bases had put American troops at risk. Many European leaders, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer among them, restricted base access or refused overflight rights to US forces during the conflict.
His timing was pointed. Donald Trump had signed a deal to end the war only hours earlier, and Hegseth told the room that allies had flunked the president’s test of whether they would back Washington.
“Predictable access”
Hegseth said Trump had asked for little. “All he said was that our jets would need to take off from bases in Europe or … our ships from ports, to strike targets in the Middle East, Iranian targets that threaten European interests even more directly than they threaten us.”
Too many allies, he went on, “said no or tried to drown us in arcane legal debates or criticised us publicly for doing what they aren’t prepared or able to do themselves.” By denying “predictable access facing overflight that never should have been in question at all,” he said, they had put American sons and daughters at risk.
The remarks will hit hardest in Britain, France, Germany and Italy. Those governments had spent the week at a G7 summit in France trying to calm Trump’s anger over their refusal to join the war. Trump has told The Telegraph that the lack of help made him question US membership of NATO.
A review and a warning on spending
Hegseth announced a six-month review of US forces in Europe. He warned of further cuts if “free-riding” governments miss a defence spending target of 5 per cent of GDP. “It’s a review that some countries will fail, and others will pass with flying colours,” he said.
The Pentagon has already told allies it plans to scale back the support it would provide if Article 5, NATO’s mutual defence clause, were triggered. Gen Alexus Grynkewich, NATO’s supreme allied commander, said that would mean an aircraft carrier, support ships, air-to-air refuelling planes and dozens of fighter jets would no longer be available in a crisis. Mark Rutte, NATO’s secretary-general, said the withdrawal of American forces from Europe had taken place with “immediate” effect.
Hegseth called his vision “Nato 3.0”: a return to “a real hardline military alliance” that can deter on the Continent and lead the conventional defence of Europe. Some allies “still need to do more,” he said, and the US would say so “both in private and in public.”
Ukraine on the agenda
The ministers were also due to meet Volodymyr Zelensky at the Ukraine Defence Contact Group, which co-ordinates military aid to Kyiv. Zelensky held talks with Rutte on deliveries of air defence munitions, and raised the idea of licences that would let Ukrainian firms build American-designed Patriot interceptors, The Telegraph reported earlier in the week. Germany and the Netherlands have each pledged hundreds of millions of dollars so Kyiv can buy the surface-to-air missiles.
Sources
- Hegseth: Britain put American lives at risk
- Hegseth slams allies for reluctance to join Iran war, says coming days 'decisive'
