President Donald Trump is using NATO’s limited support for the US operation against Iran to reopen a larger question over whether Washington’s allies can be counted on in a bigger confrontation.
In a Fox Business interview, Trump said NATO allies “should have been better” and argued they should have at least offered personnel support.
“[Iran is] a small operation compared to a big operation. But NATO was not there for us,” he said.
Trump framed Iran as a test case. “If they’re not there for us here, they’re not gonna be there for us,” he said. “So why are we spending hundreds of billions of dollars a year on NATO if they’re not going to be with us?”
He added, “If they’re not going to be with us on Iran, they’re not going to be with us on a much bigger subject than Iran.”
The comments follow earlier remarks in which Trump said he was “very disappointed in NATO” and warned the alliance would face “very serious examining” after failing to back the US in the Iran conflict.
The spending claim is directionally true only if Trump is referring to total US defense spending counted within NATO-wide defense expenditure, not direct payments to NATO. NATO’s common-funded budgets are financed through agreed cost shares, and the US share is far below “hundreds of billions.”
Full Fact reported that the US share of NATO common funding is 14.9% in 2026, the same as Germany’s. Reuters previously fact-checked a similar claim and found the US contributed about 15.8% of NATO’s annual budget in 2024, equal to roughly $567 million, not hundreds of billions. 
But on total defense spending, NATO data show the US was estimated to spend about $980 billion on defense in 2025, equal to 3.22% of GDP. European allies and Canada spent more than $574 billion combined in 2025, up 20% from 2024.
The alliance has moved toward Trump’s long-running burden-sharing demand. In 2025, all NATO allies met or exceeded the prior 2% of GDP defense spending target, while leaders also agreed to raise defense-related spending toward 5% of GDP annually by 2035.
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One Response
The key word is defense spending. Defense not War spending. You can try to twist it anyway you seem to want but it is a Defense fund, for Defense purposes. NATO is for Defense. It is not a War chest to go about attacking (without consulting the other members), other nations. Period. Millions not billions. NATO will come and help the US in any conflict where they are attacked as they have done before. 911, and even Iraq – even on bogus intel. Stop the bull.