The Lead Untangles: What's next for Nato?
Britain and Nato have a symbiotic relationship but Venezuela and Greenland have led to questions about the future of the strategic alliance which spans the Atlantic
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On Monday this week, a coalition of European leaders and US envoys announced they had agreed key security guarantees for Ukraine if a peace deal was reached, meaning they would defend the country against future attacks against Russia.
The summit came just days after the US launched a legally-dubious attack on Venezuela, including the capture of its president, Nicolás Maduro, and Donald Trump made fresh calls for the US to take over Greenland, either by purchase or military force.
The European response to the strike in Venezuela has been tepid at best. But European leaders rallied behind Denmark.
Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen of Denmark, which controls Greenland, warned that an attack would spell the end of Nato. “The American president should be taken seriously when he says he wants Greenland,” she said. “If the US chooses to attack another Nato country militarily, then everything stops... including the security that has been established since the end of the second world war.”
On social media, Trump has since stated that he “doubt[s] Nato would be there for us if we really needed them,” although he insisted that the US would still defend allied members, stating “We will always be there for Nato, even if they won’t be there for us.”
Since the invasion of Ukraine by Russia, the existence and future of Nato has been a topic of contention. But is the alliance actually at risk? And what would it mean for the UK and its allies if Nato ceased to exist?
What does Nato actually do?
Nato – which stands for North Atlantic Treaty Organisation – is a strategic alliance between 32 countries from Europe and North America formed at the end of the Second World War. It does not replace national armed forces, with member states retaining full control over their military response in a crisis, and it does not have the power to create laws for its members.
The core purpose of Nato is to guarantee the freedom and security of its members through political and military means, namely via Article 5. If Article 5 is invoked, all allies pledge to assist the attacked member in whatever way each individual country sees fit, whether by military force, logistical support or sanctions. So it does not mean an all-out war, although this prospect is meant to deter attacks from happening at all.
Article 5 has only been invoked once since its inception – after 9/11, leading to the Nato-led invasion of Afghanistan.
Britain and Nato have a symbiotic relationship. The UK’s armed forces, intelligence assets, and independent nuclear deterrent makes it a significant contributor to the alliance. Meanwhile, our national security is completely tied to Europe’s security, including our UK trade, energy supplies, airspace, and critical infrastructure such as undersea data cables. Being part of Nato allows us to have a say in European and Transatlantic security decisions.
Context
Since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine 2022, Nato shifted from a crisis management role to deterrence and defence, with a larger focus on and investment in countries in the Eastern flank (such as Poland, Finland, Sweden, Romania, and Bulgaria). This means that defence spending pledges are no longer just theoretical: At the 2025 summit, Nato members committed to raising defence spending to 5 per cent of GDP by 2035, up from the long-standing and often unmet 2 per cent.
While the Ukraine war was the catalyst, there is now a consensus between allied nations that Russia is a long-term threat, hence why countries are agreeing to a security guarantee and why Trump claims he “needs” Greenland.
Trump has been critical of Nato for years, mainly because the US pays out the biggest portion in defence spending, at least in absolute terms. He threatened to leave Nato last February and now his threats against Greenland call into question the future of America’s role in the alliance.
However, in order to withdraw from Nato, the US would require approval in the US Senate and consultation with members of both houses of Congress, nor can it ignore or abandon Article 5 without a formal notice.
If Trump were to attack Greenland, it’s unclear how things would pan out – as this would be an attack on one Nato member from another. There have been similar rifts between Nato countries in the past, all of which have been survived. For example, France pulled out of Nato’s military structures in the late-1960s over concerns about losing its foreign policy autonomy and possibly being drawn into the Vietnam war. In the 1970s, Greece withdrew from military participation in the alliance after Turkey invaded Cyprus. In more recent history, France, Germany, and Belgium vetoed Nato planning to deploy defence systems in Turkey during the Iraq war and the former two refused to support the post-invasion stabilisation efforts in Iraq.
However, for the US to attack a Nato ally would be completely unprecedented.
How is Europe responding?
Prime Minister Keir Starmer said: “The future of Greenland is for Greenland and the Kingdom of Denmark alone. Of course, Nato is hugely important, the single most effective and important military alliance the world has ever known.
“He keeps encouraging me to sort of tug away at parts of Nato and to choose between Europe and the US. That would be a strategic mistake for our country.
“Yesterday, we were working with our Nato allies, including the US, our Nato ally, on a just and lasting peace in Ukraine that will not happen without security guarantees from the coalition of the willing, backed by the US.’
French president Emmanuel Macron said: “The United States is an established power, but one that is gradually turning away from some of its allies and breaking free from international rules that it was still promoting recently.
“Multilateral institutions are functioning less and less effectively.
“We are living in a world of great powers with a real temptation to divide up the world.”
German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said: “The United States stands by the defence of the alliance and also stands by its alliance with Europe.
“I have not the slightest doubt that we stand together in the closest possible unity and that this alliance will remain exactly what it has always been: the most successful defence alliance in the world.”
What’s next for Nato?
Nato is entering a period of heightened uncertainty, driven both by external problems as well as its own political instability. With uncertainty and criticism generated by the US, Hungary’s Viktor Orbán and Germany’s right-wing opposition party Alternativ Fur Deutschland (AFD)it’s likely that next month’s Munich Security Conference will involve open discussions about the future of Nato. Not to mention, US threats to Greenland call into question Denmark’s place in the alliance, too.
It’s completely unclear what will happen in the immediate term. As with last year’s Munich Security Conference it may be that Nato remains as is, with a noisy but still intact US alliance. Another possibility is a more European-led Nato, operating within a US security umbrella, with allies needing to hedge against the US’ volatility, as has been suggested by Jeremy Shapiro is a research director at the European Council on Foreign Relations. The riskier alternative is that Nato survives formally but weakens informally, as doubt and underinvestment erode deterrence. For the UK, defence spending won’t stay abstract, and the UK will need to reassess its special relationship with President Trump. ■
About the author: Ella Glover is the audience engagement editor at The Lead. She is also a freelance journalist specialising in workers’ rights, housing, health, harm reduction and lifestyle. You can find her work in Prospect Magazine, Dazed, Observer Magazine and Women’s Health.
About The Lead Untangles: In an era where misinformation is actively and deliberately used by elected politicians and where advocates and opposers of beliefs state their point of view as fact, sometimes the most useful tool reporters have is to help readers make sense of the world. If there is something you’d like us to untangle, email ella@thelead.uk.
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