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It's not hard to see why Europe wonders whether the U.S. is still a reliable ally. Take these comments from then-candidate Trump on the campaign trail before he was elected to a second term. He was recounting a discussion with other NATO leaders about how much spending member countries should contribute to defense. One of the presidents of a big country stood up and said...
Well, sir, if we don't pay and we're attacked by Russia, will you protect us? I said, you didn't pay? You're delinquent? He said, yes. Let's say that happened. No, I would not protect you. In fact, I would encourage them to do whatever the hell they want. You got to pay. Not the words you want to hear from a key ally. In the months after his reelection, the relationship continued to be bumpy.
President Trump appeared to side with Russian President Vladimir Putin in peace negotiations with Ukraine, stunning European allies. Then, in March, he temporarily cut off U.S. aid to Ukraine. And in April, he imposed steep tariffs on imports from Europe. Some, but not all of those, have since been paused. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told a German newspaper that, quote, "...the West as we knew it no longer exists."
Here she is at a press conference in March. The world around us is changing at lightning speed. Geopolitical shifts are shaking alliances. Decade-old certainties are crumbling. And we still have a brutal war raging at our borders.
asked directly about Trump. She said that, yes, the U.S. was still an ally, but also this. I think it's a very strong wake-up call and Europe's moment now really to step up in defense. Von der Leyen has pushed a more than $800 billion plan to boost European defense spending. Secretary of State Marco Rubio says Trump supports NATO and will stay in the alliance, but he has urged allies to significantly ramp up their defenses.
The stronger our partners in NATO are, the more capable our partners in NATO are, the stronger NATO is. And everybody should be in favor of that. One country in particular has been beefing up its defense spending, Poland. Consider this. Poland has 500 miles of border with Russia and its ally Belarus. Whatever happens between the U.S. and NATO, Poland is preparing to defend itself. From NPR, I'm Juana Summers.
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It's Consider This from NPR. For Poland, it's not just about defense spending. It's also about training. Poland's prime minister, Donald Tusk, told Poland's parliament in March that by the end of this year, every adult male in the country should be trained for war. NPR's Rob Schmitz has the story. National flags, march!
A military band marches in front of an unwavering row of Poland's newest soldiers. Dozens of men and women who have answered the call to volunteer to protect their country against Russia. Watching from the sidelines at this ceremony outside of Warsaw is Anita Milewski, whose partner Dominik is about to take his oath to protect and serve. Well, how do I do it?
Męstwa, królnierstwa, bycia oddanym, bycia służbistą.
I'm emotional, she says, and a little nervous. We live in difficult times, and I feel like more difficult times are coming. There's a need, she says, for courageous people, tough people, and our Dominique is a rock. He's unbreakable. Dominique takes his oath, and the band plays the national anthem. Behind them stand a row of four Abrams tanks. After the ceremony, Dominique glances longingly at
The past month of basic training was intense, he says. We barely had time to rest. Now I'm staying on for specialized training. It's my dream to drive one of those tanks someday.
These soldiers, these tanks, they're all part of Poland's overhaul of its military. This year, the country will spend nearly 5% of its GDP on defense, more than any other NATO member, including the U.S. As a neighbor of Ukraine's and host to more than 2 million of its war refugees, Poland has seen, heard, and felt what Russia is capable of. And it's now preparing for the worst.
Hundreds of miles north of the capital, along Poland's border with Russia, bulldozers clear farmland for a landmine field, while crews place neat rows of concrete anti-tank structures called hedgehogs that look like massive gray Lego pieces. On a work break, Polish Lieutenant Iwona Misiacz gives me a tour of Poland's newly fortified border with the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.
We peer into a deep ditch filled with water, and beyond that stand rows of hedgehogs that follow the curved border for as far as the eye can see. On the other side of the ditch, beyond a fence made of razor wire, is dense birch forest. Russia.
We've learned from Ukraine's experience with Russia's invasion, and we've applied those lessons here, she says. These hedgehogs are here so that our enemy breaks his teeth before he even thinks of biting us. And here, she says, pointing to a strip of land as wide as a football field, is a space for a minefield.
Poland recently announced it was withdrawing from the Ottawa Convention, an international treaty banning the use of landmines. What we're seeing here, says Ms. Yartz, is what much of the 500-mile-long border between us and Russia and Belarus will someday look like. A very long ditch, columns of concrete hedgehogs and landmine fields. This, she says, is going to be a lot of work.
Poland has set aside more than $2 billion to build this, and its treasury is buying up land from farmers along the border for this new initiative. But that's not all the action that's happening along this tense border.
Hundreds of miles east, along another stretch of the same border, U.S. soldiers conduct training exercises. We have developed a strategy to counter any kind of mass land grab or mass land invasion or incursion that would occur. Lieutenant Colonel William Branch is commander of the Forward Land Forces Multinational Group Poland, a group of 1,000 U.S. soldiers at the Momowo-Piski training area in northeastern Poland.
His troops helped defend NATO's Eastern Front along a stretch of land known as the Suvalki Gap, a corridor where military strategists say Russia would likely target if it were to attack NATO member states.
Branch's soldiers have made visits to the nearby Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia. And along with Poland, he says, There's a persistent theme in all of those visits. These countries are actively fighting to retain their sovereignty. They're actively fighting to continue to exist because there is a real threat that exists. And while there is a real threat, agrees Mario Smarzakowski, publisher of Defense 24, a Warsaw-based security magazine,
He says Russia's European neighbors have had time to prepare, drawing on years' worth of lessons from Ukraine to study how Russia wages war. America is accustomed to quick aerial wars, he says, but Russia has retained its arsenal from the Soviet Union days.
And that means, he says, low-tech land-based warfare is what Poland is focusing on defending itself against. But Marszalkowski says the challenge now is figuring out President Donald Trump. Would the U.S. defend Poland if Russia attacked?
He says Poland's government has handled this question in vague diplomatic terms, but its actions, he says, show that it's beginning to look elsewhere for help. The Polish government, he says, sees hope in France, which has an extensive nuclear arsenal, and the terms under which it can use these weapons are different from Britain's, which require American consent before they deploy them.
So from a security perspective, he says France is a safer option from where to seek assistance.
In the next few months, he says, Poland and France will sign big strategic agreements of security cooperation that may include Poland's purchase of French air tankers, submarines, and weaponry, and may also include an agreement that Poland will now be inside France's protective nuclear umbrella. An agreement, he says, that could be as important as defense barriers along Poland's borders or a buildup of Poland's military. Anything, he says, to stop Russia.
NPR's Rob Schmitz in Poland. This episode was produced by Christine Aris-Smith and Conor Donovan with audio engineering by Nisha Hynas. It was edited by Nick Spicer, Jeanette Woods, and Nadia Lancey. Our executive producer is Sammy Yannigan. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Juana Summers. This message comes from Schwab. At Schwab, how you invest is your choice, not theirs. And
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