This raises the fundamental question: why does NATO exist in 2026? Let us recall its origins. NATO was founded in 1949 with a clear and urgent mission: to contain and, if necessary, defeat the Soviet Union.
By Josh HAMMER
A month after the start of Operation Epic Fury against the Islamic Republic of Iran, a long-overdue discussion has finally come out into the open: what, in fact, is the ongoing rationale for NATO? For decades, this question has been treated – in Washington foreign policy circles – as heresy. But it is not. And, to their credit, President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio are now saying so openly.
As Trump recently put it: “They haven’t been friends when we’ve needed them. We’ve never asked for much from them … it’s a one-way street.” Rubio was equally blunt: “If NATO is all about us defending Europe when it’s attacked, but then denying us the rights to bases when we need them, then that’s not a very good deal … So this whole thing needs to be reexamined.” They’re absolutely right.
At best, America’s European “allies” spent decades benefiting from the American security umbrella for free. Despite repeated promises to meet minimum defense spending targets, many NATO members continue to underinvest in their militaries and delegate national defense to American taxpayers.
The disparity is stark: The United States accounts for the vast majority of NATO’s military, logistics, and strategic transport capabilities. Overall, American taxpayers contribute about 60 percent of NATO’s total defense spending. At worst, some of these European allies actively undermine American operations at the most critical moments. Major Western European countries, such as Spain and France, have restricted or complicated U.S. use of their airspace during Operation Epic Fury. This is absurd. An “alliance” in which members hinder each other in waging war is not really an alliance—it is a burden.
This raises the fundamental question: why does NATO exist in 2026? Let’s remember its origins. NATO was founded in 1949 with a clear and urgent mission: to contain and, if necessary, defeat the Soviet Union. That mission was compelling – even existential. Western Europe was devastated after World War II, and the Soviet threat was real, immediate and hegemonic. The Soviet Union had collapsed more than three and a half decades earlier. The Berlin Wall fell the year I was born. The Cold War is now a historical relic. By any reasonable measure, NATO fulfilled its raison d’être in the early 90s. But instead of declaring victory and recalibrating course, the alliance moved on. It expanded ever further into Eastern Europe and shifted its stated mission to … well, something.
Put bluntly, NATO today is an organization in search of a purpose. Is NATO a collective defense pact against the Soviet Union’s geopolitical successor, the Russian Federation? If so, why do so many European NATO members fail to take this threat seriously enough to invest in their own defense? Or is NATO now a tool in the global war on terrorism? If so, why have its members stood aside and refused to join the United States in confronting the world’s leading state sponsor of jihad? Or is NATO simply a political club for liberal democracies? If so, what does this have to do with the U.S. national interest? NATO has become an all-encompassing institution, full of triumphalist slogans but poor in the strategic realities on which its existence was built.
Meanwhile, the global order is changing. The initial era of enthusiastic multilateralism – after the Cold War – is gradually being replaced by a more national-interest-oriented paradigm. States are rediscovering the importance of sovereignty, borders, and self-interest. In such a world, the idea that the United States should remain blindly tied to a 20th-century transnational alliance structure is unsustainable. This does not mean that America should isolate itself. But it does mean that alliances must be reviewed, recalibrated, and – when necessary – replaced.
The geopolitical future lies not in outdated multilateral structures, but in agile, strategic bilateral and trilateral partnerships. These smaller, more focused agreements allow for clearer expectations, greater accountability, and a more direct alignment of national interests.
They avoid the bureaucratic slowness and profit-for-nothingness that characterize large structures like NATO. The highly effective US-Israeli bilateral attack on Iran last month shows what a dynamic 21st-century alliance can do. The contrast with NATO’s sluggish Western European members is stark. For too long, American politicians have treated NATO as a dogma. But alliances are not sacrosanct. They must be constantly reassessed to see whether they still serve their purpose and advance the national interest.
If NATO fails this test – if it continues to function as an unequal arrangement where the United States pays, protects, and sacrifices while others hesitate and obstruct – then it is not only reasonable but necessary to question its future and America’s role in it. Operation Epic Fury has brought these contradictions to the fore. Something must change. The ball is now in NATO’s court. Because the status quo is no longer defensible – and deep down, everyone knows it.