'Bad blood' between US and European allies as NATO summit begins

Arms deals worth tens of billions of dollars, an "ironclad commitment" to collective defence and more support for Ukraine are expected to be the big announcements as NATO allies converge on Türkiye this week.

But it's the unexpected developments and the dynamics on the sidelines that could prove more interesting to watch.

World leaders from the 32-nation bloc will gather in the country's capital, Ankara, on Tuesday and Wednesday, local time, for what is largely a performative annual meeting to announce commitments and issue communiqués that have already been thrashed out by diplomats.

Just how performative the politics becomes depends largely on one leader in particular: US President Donald Trump.

This will be the first time since the US and Israel began fighting Iran that Trump has come face-to-face with many of the European leaders who opposed the war and refused to join the campaign or let the US use their military bases.

Spain's prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, for example, openly condemned the strikes on Iran as a breach of international law and accused the US of playing "Russian roulette with the destiny of millions".

Other leaders tried to walk a fine line between that position and offering limited defensive support to prevent the war from spreading.

Trump has both expressed anger at several European leaders for rejecting his demands for help and said his country did not need their help.

Maria Martisiute, an analyst at the European Policy Centre and a former NATO official, told the ABC she expected there would be tension in Ankara.

"When it comes to the war in Iran, it's created a lot of bad blood between the US and Europe," Ms Martisiute said.

"The Europeans have been trying behind the scenes to soothe Trump as much as possible, but there is, of course, a risk that tensions might flare up.

"I do expect that, looking forward, there will be some kind of naming and shaming of the different allies on how they support or don't support America."

Tension a 'gift to the Kremlin'

Retired Lieutenant General Ben Hodges, former commanding general of the US Army in Europe, told the ABC European leaders should not kowtow to the US president.

"Everybody tends to kind of hold their breath and hope that Trump doesn't come in and turn the table over, but I would also say it's time for nations to quit being so scared of offending the American president or being so grovelling in how they interact with him," Lieutenant General Hodges said.

"Yes, of course, the United States is an important part of the alliance ... but the fact is, even if Trump was to storm out, and I don't think this is going to happen by the way, but if he was to be very disruptive, everyone else still needs to stick together because of the importance of collective security.

"Anything that undermines the cohesion of NATO, that's a gift to the Kremlin."

Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine is now in its fifth year. Right now, Ukraine has a technological advantage over Russia and has developed drones that can strike deeper behind Russian lines and beyond. They've been targeting military logistics and oil infrastructure.

In order to stand up to Moscow, and under pressure from Trump, NATO leaders agreed at their summit in The Hague last year to boost defence-related spending to 5 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) by 2035. For more than a decade before that, the target was 2 per cent of GDP.

On Monday, London's Financial Times newspaper reported that Germany planned to borrow 800 billion euros ($1.31 trillion) by 2030 to ramp up rearmament efforts.

The US commander-in-chief has repeatedly lashed out at European allies for not pulling their weight in NATO, while threatening to quit the alliance if they did not step up.

However, according to the draft summit communique, which still needs the approval of NATO leaders this week, the alliance will remain intact, with the leaders to reaffirm their "ironclad commitment to our collective defence under Article 5 of the Washington Treaty and to the transatlantic bond. An attack on one is an attack on all".

Washington, though, has scaled back its commitments by reducing the number of American troops on European soil and increasingly forcing Ukraine's European allies to pay for weapons provided by the US.

Just last week, Trump wrote on social media that it was "Ridiculous for the USA to continue along this one-sided path when the relationship is not reciprocal. They were not there for us!!!"

NATO secretary-general Mark Rutte and other bloc leaders have insisted the alliance contributes to the United States's own security and that Europeans are heeding Trump's longstanding calls to spend more on their own defence.

The White House has said allies are off to a "good start" but that some are doing more than others, and that by forcing them to boost spending, the US was moving NATO "from a model of dependency on the United States to one of real-life sharing and self-reliance".

Currently, the only nations close to the 2035 target are Poland and Lithuania, but most others have begun to increase their defence spending.

"However, they haven't stepped up to the extent that I think would be needed in view of the threats that we are facing," Ms Martisiute said.

"There is a war raging on the European continent, and there is hybrid war raging on NATO and EU soil, at sea, under the sea, on land, in the streets, online and cyberspace.

"We are already in an undeclared war with Russians."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will be hoping the NATO summit will help remind allies of the heavy toll Russia is inflicting on his country.

Ukraine is not a member of NATO, but Zelenskyy has been invited to the meeting.

Trump spoke to both Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin over the phone in the days prior to the summit.

Zelenskyy said he and Trump had agreed to continue discussions on the sidelines of the summit.

NATO leaders are expected to pledge 70 billion euros in military assistance to Ukraine for 2026 and at least the same amount for 2027, according to the draft summit communique.