The Meaning of the Western Alliance
It wasn’t just military strength that won the Cold War.
Even before he left for Europe, Donald Trump had started with the demands and acrimony he brought with him to this week’s NATO summit. So right beforehand, Donald Tusk, the president of the European Council, pushed back. He urged America to appreciate its allies, pointing out that America didn’t have that many. Trump’s tone at the summit indicated he was more interested in hectoring them about military spending. But Tusk’s own biography shows exactly why the alliance is about so much more than defense budgets.
Tusk got his political start in the 1980s
