Let's talk about Trump calling on NATO when he should be asking the UN.... - Belle of the Ranch

[TexasTowelie]

Well, howdy there Internet people. It's Belle again. So, today we're going to talk about Trump needing the UN but calling NATO.

During an interview, Trump repeatedly mentioned NATO and seemed to imply he expected the alliance to come to his rescue after his ill-defined and unspecified plan to hit Iran damaged the global economy. He also kind of accidentally disclosed that he doesn't understand how the oil markets work. He said, "It's only appropriate that people who are the beneficiaries of the Strait will help to make sure that nothing bad happens there. If there's no response or if it's a negative response, I think it will be very bad for the future of NATO."

First, it sure seems like Trump doesn't understand that oil is a globally traded commodity and everybody all over the world benefits from the oil from the Strait because it keeps all oil prices down. But if Trump didn't understand this and thought each country used their own oil or worked out special deals or some other fictional thing, it would explain so much. Everything from his weird “drill baby drill” fascination to the US not really appearing to have a plan for the Strait makes sense if he believed it would only impact those other countries.

Second, the bad thing happening there was started by what again? Trump went on, we have a thing called NATO. We've been very sweet. We didn't have to help them with Ukraine. Ukraine is thousands of miles away from us. But we help them. Now we'll see if they help us because I've long said that we'll be there for them, but they won't be there for us. And I'm not sure that they'd be there.

In real life, Trump has undermined NATO at pretty much every turn to include lying about their troops service in Afghanistan and claiming they stayed off the front lines. That statement triggered protests by veterans. Now, Trump is implying that alliance somehow requires they help and put the troops he trashed into harm's way for his elective war. It's worth noting that many have already flatly rejected his demand. It's also very notable that Australia, a country that has supported the US in every major conflict since World War II, declined to rescue Trump.

Somebody should probably explain to Trump that he actually needs to be begging the other organization he constantly undermines, the UN. NATO is the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. North Atlantic, not Middle East. That's not just a cute comment. The NATO treaty has geographic limits. There will be a link to a brief explainer and a reading of the treaty below.

But the short version is that the famous Article 5 says, "The parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all." Did you catch that? Trump seems to have missed it. The attack must be in Europe or North America. There are expansions in article 6 to cover Turkey and some islands. But what the NATO treaty definitely doesn't cover is Trump appearing to start a war with Iran to distract from his own scandals and economic failures.

Instead of begging NATO, he should be begging the United Nations for resolutions. They probably won't provide them because, well, Trump started it. But at least then he'd be begging the right international organization to fix his mistake.

Anyway, it's just a thought. Y'all have a good day.