Omnibus, Dassault, and the Background to the Anti-Trump NATO Deal: 'It Won't Hold'

The increasingly likely arrival of Donald Trump in the White House weighs heavily on the 75th NATO summit. From the NATO summit emerged what appears to be a real pact against business and its isolationist tendencies. Marta Dassow, director of Espinia, who spoke more about the final document of the meeting, confirmed this vision of the results reached in Washington. “NATO is not divided, it is showing a sign of unity and presenting a medium-term plan to strengthen Ukraine,” explains the guest of Omnibus on La 7, former deputy foreign minister of the Monti and Letta governments. So far so good, but there is an agenda that Dassow describes as “implicit” and that looks to Trump and his possible re-election: “We expect a Trump instead of a very bruised Biden – he says -. So the idea is to have a fairly strict plan, resistant to Trump, which is basically impossible in Ukraine. In the sense that none of these decisions, especially financial ones, can lead to a possible change.”

Dassault focuses on Trump in particular: “The real issue is whether Trump will really be a spoiler of NATO’s options in Ukraine, and this is all the more questionable, because there are two trends.” The first is the intellectuals around the businessman who are pushing for a simplification of the Atlantic alliance and the defense of only those allies who will spend their money to contribute to the NATO budget. The second trend then concerns the past and future relations between Trump and the alliance: “What he has actually done is nothing, in the sense that he has not changed a single comma significantly, beyond words, in Trump’s first presidency.” – explains the director – “What he intends to do is the famous agreement with Putin.”

But the agreement with Moscow will not be that close. According to Dassault: “In the famous debate that was so fatal for Biden, Trump judged Putin's peace plan, that is, his request to surrender to Zelensky, very negatively.” For Dassault, a possible arrival in the White House will not be the end of the Atlantic alliance: “I would not be too pessimistic for one reason: NATO also responds to American interests – he says – and since Trump is a rather pragmatic man, whether he is a man who serves American interests or says he wants to do so, I do not think it is worth questioning the alliance that has become European.” Because, as Dassault explains as he concludes his speech, “the contribution of the Europeans is increasing and this allows America to devote itself more to the front that really interests it, namely China and the Indo-Pacific region.”