WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump dropped his push Tuesday to join U.S. allies in defending the Strait of Hormuz from Iranian threats — just a day after he called on nations to “get involved” to help oil tankers safely navigate the critical shipping lane.
First on social media and later in an Oval Office meeting, Trump said on February 28 that the outside military support he had been working to garner in the war launched by the US and Israel against Iran was no longer needed.
“We don’t need any help,” Trump said in an exchange with reporters in the Oval Office while hosting Irish Prime Minister Michael Martin.
“President Trump has good relationships with foreign leaders around the world. At the same time, he has long turned his attention to the unequal dynamics that weak presidents have enabled for decades — the United States’ broad economic support for NATO and unfair trade practices that hurt our farmers and workers,” White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said in a statement. “The president was resoundingly elected to put America first, and he will continue to enhance US national security through Operation Epic Fury, with or without NATO.”
Trump has received a chilly response from US allies trying to join a joint effort to police the strait, which has been effectively closed in the face of Iranian attacks that have threatened oil supplies.
On Monday, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said, “This is not our war; we did not start it.” Before Trump’s Oval Office meeting on Tuesday, French President Emmanuel Macron said his country would “never take part in an operation to open or liberate the Strait of Hormuz in the current context” but was ready to play a role once the fighting stops.
Asked about Macron’s statement, Trump said he was “going to be out of office soon.” (Macron’s term ends in May 2027.)
Trump was measured in discussing the dust-up within the NATO alliance, though one of his confidants, Sen. Lindsay Graham, RS.C. He spoke to Trump about it and “never heard him so angry in my life,” wrote X.
“The consequences of less aid to keep the Strait of Hormuz functioning will be broad and deep for Europe and America,” Graham wrote, adding that he shared Trump’s anger.
Trump has talked repeatedly in recent days about assembling a coalition that could help repel Iranian attacks against oil tankers and other vessels navigating the strait, a narrow choke point for the world’s oil.
The battle has caused a spike in gas prices, creating political problems for Trump at home ahead of congressional midterm elections in November.
Trump said at the White House on Monday that “several countries have told me they are on their way” to help. Secretary of State Marco Rubio will make the announcement, he said. No announcement or list has been released yet.
Regarding holdings, he said, “We strongly encourage other nations to engage with us and to engage quickly and with great enthusiasm.”
The Iran war is a test of Trump’s “America First” approach to global conflict. He has long been skeptical of military alliances, warning that the US builds a protective umbrella around other nations with no guarantee that beneficiaries of American power will come to its aid when needed.
That position is gone NATO countries It has sent troops into US-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan only to see them die in action.
NATO invoked the Article 5 mutual security guarantee once to protect the US after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001.
“Trump’s bullying and tendency to negotiate through a megaphone will not go down well with European allies,” Peter Westmacott, a former British ambassador to the US, told NBC News.
In 1990-91, President George HW Bush forged a broad coalition of nations to counter Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein before launching Operation Desert Storm.
Because of Bush’s painstaking diplomatic work, that conflict “literally became Saddam Hussein against the world,” said Aaron David Miller, a former State Department official and now a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
Various diplomats have said that no such consultation took place before the US-Israel attack on Iran.
Two weeks after the strikes began, some coalition-building efforts are now unfolding. In a State Department-wide cable Monday, all US diplomats were directed to tell foreign governments at the “highest appropriate level” that they should “move quickly to reduce Iran’s capabilities” because of the “high risk of attack” on their countries.
A European diplomat told NBC News: “They’re asking us to help with a war they’ve started. There’s not much enthusiasm for it. And even if European navies are sent to the Gulf, it won’t ensure the reopening of the strait. Iran can close it as long as it likes because it’s just a drone or a mine.”
Ahead of “Operation Epic Fury,” Trump sparked a series of clashes with NATO countries that strained relations on both sides of the Atlantic. Trump took on US allies with a focus on annexing Denmark’s semi-autonomous region of Greenland.
For a while, he did not rule out using force if necessary, but then he backed down in favor of a negotiated solution to the Greenland situation.
“What happened with Greenland cannot be forgotten. Trust has been damaged and it will not be easily repaired,” said a second European diplomat.
Trump has confused European allies by not using more coercive sanctions to pressure Russian President Vladimir Putin to make peace with Ukraine. Two months ago, Graham said he had “greenlit” a bipartisan bill that would impose tougher sanctions on Russia, and a Senate vote could happen within a week. In Congress, this amount is still low.
The Trump administration appears to be moving in the opposite direction, temporarily lifting sanctions last week against offshore Russian oil in hopes of boosting supplies and curbing prices.
Trump told NBC News that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky “had a much harder time making a deal” than Putin on ending the war.
Those comments irked current and former officials at home and abroad. A former senior US military official said he did not believe Trump would blame Zelensky for Russian troops occupying a democratic country. A third European diplomat expressed displeasure that Trump saw fit to criticize Zelensky as opposed to Putin. Both spoke on condition of anonymity to speak freely.
Marko Mihkelson, chairman of the Estonian parliament’s foreign affairs committee, told NBC News: “If President Trump wants to achieve peace — as he promised and worked to do — then he will have to change tactics against Russia. You cannot be a neutral mediator in this war. Russia will not stop unless they stop.”
Westmacott added: “On Ukraine, Trump has been a huge disappointment to America’s European allies. They are frustrated by his tendency to believe Putin’s lies, see Ukraine as a purely European issue, and Zelensky as an obstacle to peace when Europeans and the facts show otherwise.”
It’s unclear whether Trump will stick to the position laid out Tuesday. By his own admission, he didn’t do the “full court press” for extra help.
Differences aside, the US and its European allies must recognize the stakes and accept that their interests are aligned, Mihkelson said.
“Europeans must understand that to succeed in today’s most turbulent world and to preserve our security and stability, we must stick together,” he said.
