A leaked questionnaire shows President Donald Trump's administration has been asking NATO members to demonstrate their loyalty to him before deciding if the U.S. will cut military support for the alliance.
Bloomberg News reviewed the document asking whether each country has "been publicly supportive" of U.S. foreign policy, including strikes in the Middle East and the Western Hemisphere that were carried out without NATO consultation. It also asks what "restrictions" allies have placed on American forces using their bases, and whether they'd be "willing to reduce or eliminate any such restrictions."
"Allies have balked at the move, seeing it as an attempt to strong-arm them into ideological alignment in exchange for U.S. protection, according to people familiar with the matter who requested anonymity to discuss the private missive," Bloomberg reported
One question directly invokes Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's demand that allies stay "strong, clear, and quiet" in alignment with U.S. interests.
When the U.S. and Israel launched strikes on Iran without NATO's blessing, several countries, including Spain, barred Washington from using their bases for the operation, a restriction the questionnaire now asks about directly. Similarly, the U.S. raid that captured Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro in January, widely viewed in Europe as a violation of international law, appears to be another test case buried in the document's questions about support for American "initiatives" in the Western Hemisphere.
The questionnaire probes whether allies are steering defense contracts toward American firms, whether they've publicly opposed "made in Europe" procurement policies, and, if not, whether they'd be willing to speak out. Given a growing European push to build up domestic defense industries, this line of questioning is likely to be especially contentious.
The document was leaked amid a six-month Pentagon review of the U.S. military footprint in Europe, expected to wrap up by December, and allies are already bracing for cuts.
The U.S. has said it will pull 5,000 troops from Germany, though it separately pledged to send 5,000 additional troops to Poland after a nationalist ally won that country's presidency, an apparent reward for political alignment that adds weight to concerns the loyalty questionnaire isn't an isolated incident.
NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte has publicly defended the broader review as reasonable given rising European defense spending, calling it something that is "bringing NATO closer together."
But the questionnaire's explicit linkage of military protection to political fealty marks a sharp departure from the alliance's postwar foundation, one built on U.S. guarantees that were meant to hold regardless of individual policy disputes.
Allies and NATO officials are expected to discuss the review further at a Brussels meeting later this month.