Trump warms up to Ukraine, gets angry with Iran: Five takeaways from the NATO summit

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President Trump and other leaders wrapped up the NATO alliance’s whirlwind summit in Ankara, Turkey, on Wednesday with a number of significant developments.

Trump gave Ukraine the go-ahead to produce Patriot interceptors amid its ongoing war with Russia, a move that will be celebrated by NATO members.

At the same time, Trump lashed out at some NATO countries for not doing enough to meet defense spending goals. The president also made headlines when he ordered all trade with Spain to be cut off amid tensions over defense spending and the Iran war.

Trump left the summit with lingering questions over whether the U.S. would provide F-35 fighter jets to Turkey, the summit’s host nation, amid pushback from Israel and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle in Washington.

Here are five takeaways from this week’s NATO summit.

Rhetoric toward Iran’s leaders turns hostile

Iran launched strikes against at least three commercial vessels overnight on Tuesday shortly after the NATO summit kicked off in Turkey. The U.S. quickly retaliated, launching a series of what U.S. Central Command described as “powerful” strikes against Iran.

Trump, noticeably angered by the developments, told reporters on Wednesday that the interim deal reached between the U.S. and Iran was “over” as far as he was concerned.

“I don’t want to deal with them anymore. They’re scum,” the president said of Iran, adding it was a waste of time to deal with the country’s negotiators.

Trump continued to hit Iran throughout the day on Wednesday, referring to them as “sick people.”

The rhetoric marks a shift in tone from just weeks ago at the Group of Seven (G7) summit when Trump said he thought the Iranians were rational people and good to deal with.

When asked why his tone had changed during a press conference on Wednesday, Trump responded: “I got to know them. That’s it.”

He also said the current Iranian regime was an improvement on the previous regime. A number of Iran’s leaders were killed in U.S. and Israeli strikes during the war, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Ukraine given green light to produce Patriot interceptors

Trump said he granted Ukraine the ability to co-produce Patriot missile interceptors, a vital air defense system as Russian continues to hammer Ukraine with ballistic missiles and drones.

“Just a little birdie told me this, about the fact that we’ll give them the right to make Patriots, we’ll show them how to do it,” the president said during a bilateral meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

“It’s very complex, actually, but … you’ll figure out the complexity quickly,” Trump said. “So, one of the things we’re going to be talking about is … we’re going to give a license to you to make Patriots. That’s pretty cool.”

The Patriot system, a ground-based surface-to-air missile system, would aid Ukraine in defending its cities as the Russian military continues to pound them with missiles and drones. The system, which is used by the U.S. Army, can also intercept aircraft.

The president said the U.S. doesn’t have “many” Patriot missiles and Washington won’t be able to fork them over to Kyiv immediately.

Trump wavers on F-35s for Turkey amid pushback

Trump said on Wednesday he has not decided whether to readmit Turkey into the U.S.‘s F-35 fighter jet program amid pushback from lawmakers in Congress and Israel.

“I haven’t totally made up my mind, but my inclination is to say, look, he’s done everything,” Trump said of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. “He’s helped us in so many different ways, and you know who else has been good to us? China.”

He was responding to a question about whether he’d made a decision on bringing back Turkey, a NATO member, into the program he expelled the country from during his first term. The U.S. booted Turkey from the F-35 program in 2020 after Ankara purchased Russian S-400s air defense systems.

But on Tuesday, the president signaled his willingness to lift sanctions on Turkey, one of the hurdles to readmitting Ankara.

“I can tell you we’re going to be taking the sanctions off. OK? I don’t want him to waste his time answering that question,” Trump said.

F-35s, one of the most advanced fighter planes in the world that are typically sold to close U.S. allies, have ignited pushback from lawmakers in both parties as well as Israeli officials.

“If you give this kind of radical regime, that admittedly smiles to the president of the United States when it’s necessary, when you give it that power, you’re going to see aggression in its wake,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a Tuesday interview on CNN.

Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-Fla.), who sits on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, urged the administration against giving Turkey the supersonic stealth multirole fighter planes. He said Turkey has “cozied up to our adversaries and antagonized our allies.”

“I’m not going to sit quietly while the administration hands Ankara our most advanced fighter jets. This is a slap in the face to every ally we’ve asked to trust us, and I’m not letting it slide,” Moskowitz wrote on social media Wednesday.

Trump orders all trade with Spain to be cut off amid NATO tensions

One of the more eyebrow-raising moments of the summit came when Trump ordered the U.S. to cut off all trade with Spain amid tensions over defense spending and the U.S. war in Iran.

“Spain is a wasted cause. We don’t want to do any trade business with Spain anymore by the way,” Trump said during a bilateral meeting with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte.

“Spain is a terrible partner in NATO. They don’t participate. They don’t pay,” the president continued. “I don’t want anything to do with Spain. Cut off all trade with Spain, please, including visits.”

“Watch them come running back,” he added. “Oh, they’ll come running back.”

The office of Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, who was also present at the summit, said it was treating Trump’s comments on Tuesday as “business as usual” and that it did not intend to change what it called Spain’s “excellent” trade relations with the U.S.

Trump and his Spanish counterpart have repeatedly clashed, with tensions rising amid the war in Iran.

Spain, in particular, has been vocally critical of the Trump administration’s war with Iran and has not been afraid to slam the president. The European country has not allowed the U.S. to jointly use operated military bases in Spain for operations related to the Iran war.

Trump sparks questions with decision to fly back on old Air Force One

Trump sidestepped a question on whether his choice not to return home on the new retrofitted Air Force One — a gift from Qatar — after flying it to Turkey was due to “speculation” of “security concerns.”

He repeated comments instead about being “No. 1 on the kill list for Iran.”

“I don’t really care, because I’m doing my job,” he said.

He joked that he preferred being “No. 1 on TikTok.”

“But I’m No. 1 on the list for killing,” he said.

When a reporter followed up on why he wasn’t taking the new plane, Trump said the gifted aircraft would be flying to bases “where we can show it to the people.”

“And we’ll be going home by normal methods,” he said. “But we have it going to Europe to a couple of bases — actually one in particular — but it’s going to a couple of bases so the soldiers can see it because it’s truly magnificent.”

Trump announced earlier Wednesday that he would be sending the new plane to Royal Air Force Mildenhall in the United Kingdom and would instead be taking the older plane for his flight to the base.

“To honor our brave men and women of the Military, we are sending the brand new, and truly spectacular, Air Force One to Mildenhall Air Force Base, in the United Kingdom, to give them a chance to tour the Aircraft — Everybody is so excited, and we thought that they should be the first,” he wrote on Truth Social.

“For old time’s sake, we’ll be taking the former Air Force One, from Turkey to Mildenhall, a short trip that is totally worth doing in order to give our Great Military Heroes a chance to appreciate our beautiful new addition to the Air Force Fleet!” he added.

Throughout his comments at NATO on Wednesday, Trump repeatedly mentioned that he was a target of Iran’s.

The Associated Press reported last week that the new plane appears to not be equipped with some of the same missile detection and countermeasure systems as the older planes, and one expert told the outlet that the Qatari plane seemed better for domestic trips.

The Qatari plane was unveiled last month. It completed one domestic trip to North Dakota last week and was used by the president to fly to Turkey.

Tags

Ali Khamenei

Benjamin Netanyahu

Jared Moskowitz

Recep Tayyip Erdoğan

Volodymyr Zelensky

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