No one knows if NATO will survive the Iran war, but if it does, it will be a very different alliance from the one now in place. If NATO survives, it will do so as what we refer to as a European-U.S. NATO, or possibly as a European NATO.
The United States and Israel launched the Iran War without warning and without consulting NATO allies. When these countries refused to participate in the war and the blockade, President Donald Trump threatened to withdraw from NATO.
The European nations responded by forming a coalition that we refer to as European NATO. European NATO is a coalition of countries supporting military action to open the Hormuz Strait and protect shipping through it, but only after the Iran war ends. That coalition does not include the United States, which the Europeans identify as a belligerent country, with Israel and Iran.
The decision by European NATO to mobilize military forces required to protect freedom of shipping in the Hormuz Strait follows the precedent set in 2024. That year, the European Union Naval Force Operation Aspides was organized to protect shipping in the Red Sea, Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean. This military operation was in response to a U.N. Security Council resolution that mandated the cessation of Houthi attacks on shipping.
Mark Rutte, the secretary general of NATO, explained the rationale for these decisions in his meeting with Trump. He stated that NATO now has an unhealthy dependence on the United States and that European countries have taken steps to reduce their dependence, most notably by increasing national military expenditures.
Article V of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization states that an armed attack against one NATO member shall be considered an attack on all members, who are then obligated to come to its assistance. The decision to go to war requires a unanimous vote of all NATO members. Article V has been invoked only once, after the terrorist attack against the United States in 2001.
We should expect our European allies in NATO to pursue their own interests and protect their sovereignty. They may decide that NATO is no longer in their interests and end the alliance. They will certainly not participate in a NATO alliance in which the United States launches war without warning or consultation. If the European countries decide to continue the alliance, it will require a fundamental change to the organization’s governing structure.
Our European allies have already taken a new leadership role in NATO’s command structure. European countries, including NATO’s newest members, play a more important role in the alliance’s command structure. All of the Joint Forces Command, which leads the operational level in military conflicts, is now led by our European allies. The United States continues to lead all military command structures through its role as Supreme Allied Commander Europe. That position has always been led by an American four-star officer. In a new command structure, the position of Supreme Allied Commander Europe could be rotated among the allied countries, just as the other commands are rotated.
U.S. cooperation in a new NATO is likely to be resisted by the Trump administration. The administration will argue that U.S. participation in a new Europe-U.S. NATO would diminish our ability to respond to military crises and diminish our sovereignty. The United States may even choose to withdraw from NATO, as Trump has suggested, a move that would require congressional approval.
However, such a decision would be a grievous error resulting in a power vacuum and a fundamental restructuring of the international balance of power. The Russians, Chinese and Iranians would be the main beneficiaries of a dissolution of NATO; they would quickly move in to expand their power if there is a power vacuum in the Middle East, just as they did after the Suez Crisis.
The United States should support a new Europe-U.S. NATO because it is the best way to advance the Eisenhower Doctrine, which has guided U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East for more than half a century. The Eisenhower Doctrine, which was formulated in the chaos after the Suez Crisis, commits U.S. forces to “secure and protect the territorial integrity and political independence of such nations, requesting such aid against overt armed aggression from any nation controlled by international communism.” President Dwight Eisenhower understood that American interests are best achieved through cooperation with NATO allies.
The alternative now is not business as usual in NATO, as our European allies have made clear; rather, it is a new NATO with or without U.S. participation. NATO has never been more important to the peace and prosperity of the global economy. A new European-U.S. NATO may be the best and only way for the alliance to survive.
Barry W. Poulson is professor emeritus at the University of Colorado and is on the board of the Prosperity for US Foundation. William Owens is a former vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and is also on the board of Prosperity for US Foundation. They wrote this for Inside.Sources.com
