Nearly half of Americans link defence of NATO to allies' spending: Poll

Nearly half of Americans believe that the United States should not be required to defend NATO allies from attack if they do not spend more on defence, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted after USPresident Donald Trump`s trip to Europe.

America`s NATO allies have been shaken by Trump`s harangue against them in Brussels over their under-spending on defence, and his unrestrained effort to curry favour with Russian President Vladimir Putin during their meeting in Helsinki.

A commitment to collective defence is the bedrock of the NATO alliance. It was founded in 1949 to contain the military threat from the Soviet Union. Its charter`s Article V stipulates that an attack on one ally is an attack against all.

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NATO diplomats have told Reuters they worry that Trump`s portrayal of NATO as an alliance in crisis has raised concern that the USpresident`s nagging criticism might erode USpublic support and risk America`s commitment to collective defence. In the poll, 49 per cent of respondents said the United States should not have to uphold its treaty commitments if allies do not spend more on defence. Another 18 per cent said they were not sure if the United States had to uphold those commitments.

A third of those polled said did not agree with the idea of linking America`s treaty commitments to an increase in allies` defence spending.

Two-thirds of registered Republicans said the United States should not have to uphold its treaty commitments, while almost four out of 10 Democrats held that view.

NATO, which has viewed Moscow as a threat to European stability in the wake of Russia`s 2014 annexation of Crimea from Ukraine, relies on the United States` military superiority to face down a host of threats on Europe`s borders. That includes a resurgent, nuclear-armed Russia and militant attacks.

Trump lambasted allies for failing to meet a spending target of 2 per cent of a country`s economic output. He also has claimed that the United States pays for 90 per cent of European security, which NATO data shows are incorrect.

While US defence spending makes up 70 per cent of combined allied governments` military budgets, just 15 per cent of US expenditure is spent in Europe on NATO-related defence.

After travelling to Belgium and Britain, Trump stunned the world in Finland on Monday by failing to hold Putin accountable for meddling in the 2016 US election as the two stood side-by-side. Trump said on Tuesday he misspoke.

The Reuters/Ipsos poll gathered responses from 1,011 registered voters throughout the United States, including 453 Republicans and 399 Democrats. The poll has a credibility interval, a measure of precision, of 4 percentage points.

The poll also found that while more than half of Americans disapprove of the way Trump is handling relations with Russia, his performance at the Helsinki summit did not seem to have an impact on his overall approval rating.