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The internal email describes the well-vented frustration in Washington with some NATO countries for blocking US forces from using air bases in their territories to refuel military aircraft, and from their airspace while enroute to bomb Iran.
The refusal for access to basing and overflight rights – known as ABO – is detailed in the email first reported by Reuters as being “just the absolute baseline for NATO”, according to an unnamed official in the report.
Meanwhile, a senior NATO source has told Euronews that the tone expressed in the email is “not surprising” given US President Donald Trump’s “unhappiness with Europe, and particularly Spain”.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has been the most vocal European voice against the US-Israel war in Iran.
From the earliest days of the war, when other countries offered quiet endorsement of the strikes, Spain denied the US access to use jointly-operated military bases on Spanish territory, rebuking the attacks in Iran as “unjustified and dangerous military intervention”.
The NATO source points out that Trump’s frustration with Spain goes back to Sánchez ’s refusal to increase military spending from 2.1% of GDP to 5% in line with the commitment from all other NATO allies, for which Trump described Spain as a “laggard.” “They have no excuse not to do this, but that’s all right. Maybe you should throw them out of NATO, frankly,” he said soon after.
“It goes back to the political gamesmanship that Sánchez is deploying to appease his political base,” said the source. “They’re the only country which said they don’t need to spend 5% on defence,” the source told Euronews.
At Trump’s request, NATO allies agreed to increase defence spending to a historic 5% of GDP by 2035 at the alliance’s annual leaders’ summit in The Hague last year. But Madrid insists Spain can reach its capability targets by spending 2%.
Meanwhile, Sánchez shut down questions about the report saying the government relies on “official documents and positions, not informal communications”, he told reporters at an EU leaders summit in Cyprus on Friday.
The Pentagon email, which is reportedly from the higher echelons of the US Department of Defence, also considers seeking retribution against the UK after British Prime Minister Keir Starmer publicly refused to join the war.
The email considers reassessing US diplomatic support for longstanding European “imperial possessions”, such as the Falkland Islands near Argentina.
The US State Department has long endorsed the UK as the official administrator of the Falkland Islands, after the 1982 war which saw Britain reconquer the islands.
But Argentina has always claimed the islands as theirs, and its current President Javier Milei is a close Trump supporter.
Experts say it’s not possible for Spain’s NATO membership to be suspended by the US, but that Trump’s frequent criticism of the 77-year-old transatlantic alliance is seriously damaging.
“You can’t kick people out of NATO unless there’s been a material breach of process, which in the case of Spain there is absolutely no evidence,” said former British Army Captain, Dr. Patrick Bury.
“But he’s [Trump] run NATO down so much, can it survive the next three years?” he told Euronews during a phone interview.
NATO countries were “well within their rights to refuse access to the military bases,” he said.
“In 1986, during US action against Libya, both France and Spain closed their air bases to the US, so there is a precedent for them doing that,” he added.
“There was no consultation with NATO over this war, and Iran is not NATO territory,” said Bury, who is a lecturer specialising in warfare and counter-terrorism at Bath University, UK.
He also questioned the rationale for whomever leaked the document, positing whether its publication is part of a more comprehensive strategy by the US administration to do harm to NATO.
Trump’s verbal attacks and threats to withdraw from NATO are ever more frequent since the war in Iran. He has since dismissed the alliance as a “paper tiger”, and accused allies of leaving him stranded over Iran.
“The bigger question is who leaked this and why did they do it?” asked Bury.
“Was it part of a wider drive to run down NATO, or to send a message to allies to agree to do something regards the Strait of Hormuz?”
The Strait of Hormuz – one of the world’s most important international shipping routes – has been shut down because of the war in Iran.
Iran initially blockaded the Strait for Western shipping supplies, triggering the ongoing chaos and sky-high energy prices.
Since then, the US initiated a blockade ensuring the waterway is fully-closed for all global shipping. Attempts to resolve the crisis through diplomatic channels led by Pakistan and Turkey remain stalled.
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