The United States has threatened to "reexamine" the merit of the NATO alliance after European members refused to support American military operations against Iran, marking what defense analysts describe as the most serious crisis in the alliance's 77-year history.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio delivered the stark warning in remarks to reporters on Sunday, stating that Washington would reassess its commitment to the transatlantic alliance if European partners continued to withhold support for what he termed "collective security operations" in the Middle East.
"We have to ask ourselves: what is the point of maintaining an alliance where the burden falls entirely on American shoulders?" Rubio said, according to Bloomberg. "When our allies refuse to stand with us in moments that matter, we must reexamine whether these arrangements serve American interests."
The crisis deepens a rift that emerged when Spain, Germany, and France all declined to provide military support or allow their airspace to be used for operations related to the Iran conflict. Spain went further, closing its airspace entirely to US military aircraft involved in the campaign.
To understand today's headlines, we must look at yesterday's decisions. The current tensions echo the 2003 Iraq War divisions, when France and Germany opposed the American invasion. But this crisis goes considerably further, with US officials now questioning the alliance structure itself rather than merely criticizing individual policy disagreements.
NATO, established in 1949 as a bulwark against Soviet expansion, has never faced an explicit threat of American withdrawal. While former President Donald Trump frequently criticized European defense spending during his first term, he stopped short of suggesting the alliance might be dissolved.
European officials responded with alarm to Rubio's comments. A senior EU diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, told reporters that European nations view the Iran conflict as "an American war of choice, not a defensive operation that triggers alliance obligations."
The North Atlantic Treaty's Article 5, which commits members to mutual defense, applies only to attacks on member states. Iran's retaliatory strikes have not targeted NATO territory, though Iranian missiles did hit US forces stationed in Saudi Arabia, wounding more than a dozen American personnel.
Defense experts warned that a fracturing of NATO would fundamentally reshape global security architecture. "This would be the most significant geopolitical earthquake since the end of the Cold War," said one former Pentagon official who requested anonymity to discuss sensitive alliance matters. "Without NATO, Europe loses its security guarantee, and America loses its forward presence in the most strategically vital region for containing Russia."
The timing could hardly be worse for European security. With the war in Ukraine entering its fifth year and Russia continuing to threaten eastern NATO members, the alliance's cohesion has been considered essential to deterring further Russian aggression.
Poland and the Baltic states, which rely heavily on NATO's Article 5 guarantee against potential Russian attack, have remained conspicuously silent on the US-Iran conflict, apparently calculating that maintaining American commitment to European defense outweighs any position on Middle East policy.
