OTTAWA — Prime Minister Mark Carney is heading to a summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in Turkey this week with a message that Canada is now pulling its weight in the alliance and ready to do what it takes to get to its ambitious spending target set for 2035.
But Canada’s increased defence spending will without a doubt be overshadowed by U.S. President Donald Trump’s musings in Ankara, whether they are about Iran, Greenland, or leaving NATO altogether.
It was almost midnight in Brussels and the leaders of Europe were locked in their fifth hour of an emergency meeting with a single theme for discussion: how to manage a breakup with America.
The new year was only three weeks old and President Trump, after removing Venezuela’s autocratic strongman, had briefly threatened to seize Greenland from Denmark. Around a circular table in the European Council headquarters known as “The Space Egg,” heads of government were venting so emotionally about the 47th president that some of the nearly 30 leaders present would later call the session “therapy night.” There were no cameras or recordings and each of the presidents and prime ministers was told to come alone, no phones allowed, for a moment to speak candidly.
Good for Europe! All the best in your future dealings with Russia and China.
ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Since he started work as NATO secretary-general almost two years ago, Mark Rutte has spent much of his time trying to keep the United States anchored to the world’s biggest military alliance, employing outright flattery to dissuade U.S. President Donald Trump from acting on threats to abandon it.
But the goalposts keep shifting, raising the stakes ahead of this week’s summit in Turkey.
Prime Minister Mark Carney is scheduled to leave for Ankara on Monday to attend the annual NATO summit — the first visit by a Canadian prime minister to Turkey since 2015.
Turkey’s capital will make up the first leg of Carney’s week-long sojourn to the Middle East, which will conclude with a short stay in Saudi Arabia aimed at deepening trade and investment ties.
Good luck weasels!
WASHINGTON—Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was planning to head to Brussels last month to deliver what would be a bombshell announcement in a meeting with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s top military chiefs.
The U.S., he planned to say, was preparing additional cuts to its forces in Europe that would go beyond the canceled deployment of an armored brigade to Poland and the earlier withdrawal of an infantry brigade from Romania, people familiar with the matter said. But Hegseth’s proposal was nixed after it was shared with Marco Rubio—President Trump’s national-security adviser—and other senior officials, the people said.
Or Russia’s plans for Poland were revealed.
Russia is planning an armed “provocation” on Polish soil to test Nato’s resolve, the United States has warned.
Polish critical infrastructure could be targeted by missiles and drones or Russian soldiers could cross the border into Nato territory.
Washington has issued several warnings to Warsaw about the plot, sources close to Karol Nawrocki, the Polish president, told Onet, the Polish news outlet, which, along with The Telegraph, is owned by Axel Springer and is part of its Global Reporters Network.
A nightmare scenario has been playing on eastern European minds with increasing intensity since Donald Trump returned to the White House: what if Russia attacks and the US does not join the fight?
On the rare occasions the question is posed out loud, nobody much likes the answer. In mid-May, at a gathering in Tallinn, the US undersecretary of state Thomas DiNanno was asked directly whether American troops would fight if Russia invaded the Baltic states. He shifted uncomfortably in his chair, then gave a meandering answer. It did not include the word “yes”.
On Thursday, U.S. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth announced in a meeting with NATO allies in Brussels that the Pentagon would begin a six-month review of U.S. military involvement in Europe. This review, he asserted, “will be designed to ensure that NATO is moving fast and irreversibly toward Europe leading, stepping up to take primary responsibility for the defence of Europe.”
or 70 years, the transatlantic relationship rested on a fiction that flattered both sides. America was the guarantor of a rules-based order, and Europe was its co-architect. The fiction was useful, and for a long stretch it was even partly true. But it hid a harder fact, and that fact is now impossible to ignore. Europe was never the coauthor of that order. It was its protected interior. The arrangement had a name we were too polite to use: a protectorate.
As sunbeams pierce the storm clouds over Latvia’s coastline, the US navy Seabees are building the boat ramps that may one day be needed to counter a Russian invasion.
“Run the tape, fellahs,” cries out Capt Allen Willey, the Seabees’ commanding officer, as his seamen measure up a wire grid inside the ramp. “It’s like a game of hopscotch.”
The veteran of four decades takes a closer look at the precise 11-degree incline of the ramp, used for offloading troops, vessels and military vehicles. His sailors brace for his verdict. Then his hard features break into a boyish smile. “Love it.”
For decades after the end of the Cold War in 1989, defense was not a high priority for European leaders.
Military spending was slashed, armed forces were downsized, and equipment stockpiles depleted, resulting in diminished combat readiness.
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, however, served as a wake-up call and prompted European governments to reverse course and focus on defense.
Growing uncertainty about US security commitments under President Donald Trump accelerated the trend.
U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Thursday lashed out at NATO allies during the announcement of a six-month Pentagon review of U.S. forces in Europe, saying the future of the alliance depended on others stepping up their defence spending.
He also appeared to take a veiled dig at recent remarks made by Prime Minister Mark Carney about middle powers needing to band together.
Europe like Canada will have to contend with a huge 5th Column and traitor class capable of upending any effort at self defense.
When you invite the enemy to overrun your country expect negative consequences Canada.
Canada is not capable of defending its borders and there will no Band of Middle Powers riding to the rescue.
US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on Thursday berated NATO alliance partners over their military spending and lack of initial support for the US war in Iran.
Addressing fellow defense ministers at NATO headquarters in Brussels, Hegseth doubled down on US President Donald Trump’s threat to withdraw troops from Europe — where Washington stations them in order to aid in the defense of Europe, as well as to enable the more rapid projection of US military might abroad.
Hegseth said Washington would conduct a review to “examine America’s force posture and basing in Europe.”
Boris Pistorius doesn’t look like a man prone to alarmism.
Germany’s defence minister is frank and plain-spoken, but also deliberate with his words and intention.
When he talks about Russia, the future of the West and the possibility of another European war, the message however becomes stark: “Our experts say it can happen in 2029.”
Wait. What? That’s three years from now.
Only 11% of Europeans consider the United States to be an ally, a historic low, according to a survey by the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) released on Wednesday.
Six months ago, 16% of people across 15 countries in Europe said they viewed the US as an ally, while in November 2024, when Donald Trump won the US presidential election, the figure stood at 22%.
The ECFR poll shows Europeans “embrace self-reliance and are clear-eyed about Donald Trump,” although they don’t expect the relationship to collapse entirely under the weight of the current challenges.
A majority of respondents said they did not think the US would come to Europe’s defense if it were attacked.
The Eurotrash pictured above have been unable and or unwilling to secure Europe’s borders against an ongoing mass illegal alien invasion.
France has virtually ceded control of the Banlieues to Islamists and criminal gangs.
They won’t protect their own people so why should the USA waste it’s time on them?
Carney is a likeminded Eurotrash wannabe who wants us to ally with these blowhard frauds.
