NATO leaders gather next week in Ankara, where Europeans aim to set aside strife with U.S. President Donald Trump over ‌Iran and Greenland and show they are stepping up to defend the continent as Washington cuts ​back on its commitments to the alliance.

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte says the gathering next Tuesday (July 7) and Wednesday (July 8) ⁠will show Europeans are honouring pledges to hike defence spending to deter Russia from any attack, with arms deals worth tens of billions of dollars to be signed.

Leaders are also expected to vow to keep funding weapons for Ukraine’s fight against Russia’s invasion. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy ‌will attend a dinner hosted by Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, who will also hold bilateral talks with Mr. Trump.

European officials say they hope Mr. Trump’s strong relationships with Mr. Erdogan and Mr. Rutte will ensure a smooth summit but cannot ‌be sure, given lingering transatlantic bitterness over the Iran war and the U.S. President’s frequent criticism of NATO.

In a Truth ‌Social ⁠post on Thursday (July 2), Mr. Trump complained the United States was spending money to protect NATO members “without getting ⁠any benefit from so doing”.

Mr. Rutte and other NATO leaders have insisted the alliance contributes to the United States’ own security and that Europeans are heeding Mr. Trump’s longstanding calls to spend more on their own defence.

“The summit next week will focus on turning extra spending into combat-ready ​capabilities, and significantly scaling up our defence industries,” Mr. Rutte ‌said in Berlin on Wednesday (July 1).

“NATO is, and will always be, a transatlantic alliance but we need to rebalance it for the better,” he added. “Working closely with the United States, European allies and Canada are taking greater responsibility for conventional defence in Europe.”

Mr. Rutte said last month that NATO’s European members and Canada spent $90 billion more on defence in 2025 than in ‌the previous year, to reach a total of more than $570 billion.

Spending on core defence items

In The Hague last year, NATO leaders ​agreed to spend 3.5% of GDP on core defence items such as weapons and troops by 2035 – up from a previous goal of 2%. They also agreed to invest a further 1.5% of GDP ⁠on broader defence-related investments such as boosting cybersecurity.

European officials are hoping for a repeat of that summit, where Mr. Trump reaffirmed the U.S. commitment to the 32-member alliance and its Article 5 mutual defence pact, as well ‌as praising his fellow leaders.

But the past 12 months have severely strained the alliance, with Mr. Trump threatening to take Greenland from fellow NATO member Denmark and then waging a war against Iran that roiled the global economy without consulting European allies.

The U.S. has also announced troop withdrawals from Europe, cut the forces it assigns to NATO’s defence plans – including an aircraft carrier, refuelling aircraft, fighter jets and drones – and launched a six-month review of its military presence on the continent.

“The alliance is alive and kicking but a bit bruised,” said a European diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity.

European officials worry ‌that the Iran war could overshadow the summit – if there is a flare-up in the conflict, currently the subject of a fragile ceasefire, or ​if Mr. Trump vents his anger at Europeans for not doing more to assist U.S. military operations.

Mr. Trump suggested this meant the U.S. did not need to honour its commitment to aid a fellow NATO member under ⁠attack.

NATO officials also say the vast majority of allies honoured commitments to allow the U.S. to use their airspace and bases ⁠on their territory, even though the war was deeply unpopular in Europe and many European leaders did not support it.

The war also ruptured personal ties between Mr. Trump and European leaders such as Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and ‌outgoing British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, raising the possibility that those strains could resurface at the summit.

U.S. President Donald Trump heaped praise Saturday (January 25, 2026) on British soldiers who fought in Afghanistan, in a post on social media that represented a partial reversal of comments he made this week that drew a cascade of criticism in the U.K., particularly from families of those killed and seriously injured in the conflict.

In the wake of a conversation earlier with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Mr. Trump said on Truth Social that the “great and very brave soldiers of the United Kingdom will always be with the United States of America.” He described the 457 British servicemen and women who died in Afghanistan and those that were badly injured, as “among the greatest of all warriors.”

Mr. Trump added that the bond between the two countries’ militaries is “too strong to ever be broken” and that the U.K. “with tremendous heart and soul, is second to none (except for the USA).”

Mr. Trump’s comments follow an interview with Fox Business Network on Thursday (January 22, 2026) in Davos, Switzerland, when he said he wasn’t sure the other 31 nations in NATO would be there to support the United States if and when requested and that troops from those countries stayed “a little off the front lines.”

Mr. Trump did not apologise directly for those comments, nor retract them, as PM Starmer had suggested in his initial response on Friday (January 23, 2026) when he described the words of the president as “insulting and frankly appalling.” Starmer’s office in No 10 Downing Street said the issue was raised in a conversation between the pair on Saturday (January 24, 2026) , in which other topics were discussed, including the war in Ukraine and security in the Arctic region.

“The prime minister raised the brave and heroic British and American soldiers who fought side by side in Afghanistan, many of whom never returned home,” Downing Street said in a statement. “We must never forget their sacrifice.”

Mr. Trump’s view as expressed in the Fox Business interview stands at odds with the reality that in October 2001, nearly a month after the 9/11 attacks, the U.S. led an international coalition in Afghanistan to destroy al-Qaida, which had used the country as its base, and the group’s Taliban hosts.

Alongside the U.S. were troops from dozens of countries, including from NATO, whose mutual-defenxe mandate had been triggered for the first time after the attacks on New York and Washington.

More than 150,000 British troops served in Afghanistan in the years after the invasion, the largest contingent after the American one.

The Italian and French governments also expressed their disapproval at Mr. Trump’s comments, with both describing them as “unacceptable.”

President Donald Trump ‍remains committed to the NATO alliance even as he ​and his national security team are ‌holding active discussions about a U.S. purchase ​of Greenland, White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said on Wednesday (January 7, 2026).

Mr. Trump, who has long wanted to acquire Greenland for its mineral resources, has raised tensions with NATO allies by not ruling out the possibility of taking the territory ​by force.

Greenland, through its connection to ⁠Denmark, is considered a part of NATO.

“All options are always on the table for President Trump,” Ms. Leavitt told reporters ​at a White House ⁠briefing. “The president’s first option always has been diplomacy.”

Ms. Leavitt said an acquisition of Greenland would give the United States more control over the ‌Arctic region and an ability to counter ‌aggression in a strategic area.

“The president has been very open and clear ‍with all of you and with the world that he views it in the best ‍interest of the United States to deter Russian and Chinese aggression in the Arctic region, and so that’s why his team is currently talking about what a potential purchase would look like,” she said.

Mr. Trump said earlier on Wednesday (January 7) the U.S. would support NATO and that Russia ⁠and China only feared the alliance as long as the United States was ​a member.

“We will always be there for NATO, ⁠even if they won’t be there for us,” he said in a post on Truth Social.

Ms. Leavitt said she had not heard Trump question Denmark’s claim to Greenland.