{"id":40516,"date":"2026-01-26T18:47:32","date_gmt":"2026-01-26T18:47:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/?p=40516"},"modified":"2026-01-26T18:47:32","modified_gmt":"2026-01-26T18:47:32","slug":"europe-must-stop-dreaming-about-defence-without-us-rutte-warns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/?p=40516","title":{"rendered":"Europe must stop \u2018dreaming\u2019 about defence without US, Rutte warns"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> \n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free<\/p>\n<p class=\"article__content-sign-up-topic-description o3-type-body-base\">Your guide to what Trump\u2019s second term means for Washington, business and the world<\/p>\n<p><iframe class=\"article__content-sign-up-iframe close\" scrolling=\"no\" id=\"signUpIframe\" data-prev-url=\"\/register\/in-article-sign-up?ft-content-uuid=e2f6cd48-2f89-4b75-9aae-fb9e70e773fd&amp;newsletter-id=65b8fec772badb00166eafc6\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<div id=\"article-body\">\n<p>Europe is \u201cdreaming\u201d if it believes it can defend itself without US backing, Nato\u2019s secretary-general has warned, pushing back against calls in some EU capitals to prepare for a future without Washington\u2019s protection.<\/p>\n<p>The comments come after Donald Trump threatened to use military force to seize Greenland from Nato ally Denmark and to impose tariffs on other allies who opposed him \u2014 remarks that unsettled European governments and reignited debate over the continent\u2019s reliance on the US. Although the US president rescinded the threats last week, they prompted renewed calls for Europe to accelerate efforts to strengthen its own defence capabilities.<\/p>\n<p>Mark Rutte, Nato\u2019s secretary-general <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/content\/fe1aad9e-3bd0-48e0-98fa-33fab2fb91dd\" title=\"\" data-trackable=\"link\">who last week persuaded Trump<\/a> to withdraw his threats, dismissed those arguments on Monday. Rutte told EU lawmakers that building a fully independent European defence would be prohibitively expensive and would benefit only the bloc\u2019s adversaries, including Russian President Vladimir Putin.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf anyone thinks here\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009that the European Union or Europe as a whole can defend itself without the US, keep on dreaming,\u201d he said in remarks to the European parliament. \u201cYou can\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think there will be a lot of duplication and I wish you luck if you want to do it, because you have to find the men and women in uniform\u2009.\u2009.\u2009.\u2009on top of what is happening already,\u201d he said. \u201cIt will make things more complicated. I think Putin will love it. So think again.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Independence from the US security umbrella that has shielded Europe since the second world war was once a niche idea, promoted largely by France.<\/p>\n<p>But the notion of \u201cstrategic autonomy\u201d has moved steadily into the EU mainstream in recent years, as Donald Trump\u2019s erratic approach to Nato allies \u2014 reinforced by Russia\u2019s 2022 invasion of Ukraine \u2014 has sharpened debate over how Europe can strengthen its own defence capabilities.<\/p>\n<p>Last year Nato allies agreed to lift their defence spending to 5 per cent of GDP by 2035, responding to Trump\u2019s demand that Europe shoulder a larger share of the burden for its own defence.<\/p>\n<p>Even so, experts warn that fully replacing the US role in Europe \u2014 particularly in areas such as advanced weaponry and critical capabilities on which European forces have relied for decades \u2014 would be vastly more expensive.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf you really want to go it alone, forget that you can ever get there with 5 per cent [defence spending]. It will be 10 per cent,\u201d Rutte said on Monday. \u201cYou have to build up your own nuclear capability. That costs billions and billions of euros.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/content\/e2f6cd48-2f89-4b75-9aae-fb9e70e773fd\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for free Your guide to what Trump\u2019s second term means for Washington,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":40517,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40516","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-us","cs-entry","cs-video-wrap"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40516","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40516"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40516\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/40517"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40516"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40516"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/financialrush.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40516"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}