US President Donald Trump said in a newspaper interview published on Wednesday that he is considering pulling his country out of NATO, slamming the defence alliance as a “paper tiger”.
“I would say (it’s) beyond reconsideration,” he said in remarks to the UK daily The Telegraph.
“I was never swayed by NATO. I always knew they were a paper tiger and Putin knows that too, by the way.”
Trump has repeatedly railed against Western partners for not responding to his call to assemble a naval force to help reopen the crucial Strait of Hormuz, which has effectively been closed by Tehran as the war in the Middle East grinds on.
“Beyond not being there, it was actually hard to believe. And I didn’t do a big sale. I just said, ‘Hey’, you know, I didn’t insist too much. I just think it should be automatic,” Trump said.
Those comments were echoed by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who said the US would “have to reexamine” its relationship with NATO.
"I think there's no doubt, unfortunately, after this conflict is concluded, we are going to have to reexamine that relationship. We're going to have to reexamine the value of NATO in that alliance for our country," Rubio said to host Sean Hannity on Fox News.
Rubio said he had been "one of the strongest defenders of NATO" in the US Senate because he "found great value in it."
Much of that value was in having military bases in Europe that allowed the US military "to project power into different parts of the world," he said.
"If now we have reached a point where the NATO alliance means that we can't use those bases, that in fact we can no longer use those bases to defend America's interests, then NATO is a one-way street," he added.
Rubio went further, saying that while Washington was not asking NATO allies to conduct air strikes as part of the war against Iran, "when we need them to allow us to use their military bases, their answer is 'No?' Then why are we in NATO? You have to ask that question."
Rubio's comments come after several European countries have restricted the US military from using bases on their soil.
Earlier on Tuesday, it was revealed that Italy had denied a US aircraft permission to land while it was en route to the Middle East for a combat mission.
And on Monday, Spain closed its airspace to US planes carrying out missions against Iran.
Defending the alliance
Meanwhile, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer came to NATO’s defence on Tuesday, calling it "the single most effective military alliance the world has ever seen."
"It has kept us safe for many decades, and we are fully committed to NATO," Starmer said at a press conference.
Starmer also said the UK would host a meeting of about 35 countries this week to discuss reopening the Strait of Hormuz.
Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper will host the discussions, Starmer told reporters during a Downing Street press conference, without specifying when the talks would take place.
The meeting will "assess all viable diplomatic and political measures that we can take to restore freedom of navigation, guarantee the safety of trapped ships and seafarers and resume the movement of vital commodities," Starmer said.
"Following that meeting, we will also convene our military planners to look at how we can marshal our capabilities and make the strait accessible and safe after the fighting has stopped," he added.
The discussions will include countries that recently signed a statement saying they were ready "to contribute to appropriate efforts to ensure safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz," Starmer said.
Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the Netherlands are among those to have signed it.
Iran has virtually closed the vital strait since the opening US-Israeli salvo that started the war on 28 February, causing global oil and gas prices to soar.
A fifth of the world's oil and liquefied natural gas passes through the strait in peacetime.
