Spare a thought for NATO officials and diplomats. They have spent the last six months preparing a summit that could be rendered irrelevant in a matter of days. It's not that the meeting — focused on new measures to reinforce Europe in a crisis — is unimportant. The fear is that U.S. President Donald Trump will undo any progress NATO leaders achieve in Brussels this week when he meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin just four days later.
So far, the defense-centered core of the Western alliance has proven strikingly sturdy, even as U.S.-European collaboration has collapsed on other issues, such as climate change, trade and Iran. The Trump administration pleasantly surprised many across the Atlantic by nearly doubling the Obama-era program to fund U.S. military presence in Europe. Almost 1,000 Americans in uniform are now deployed in Poland. By most accounts, the alliance's ability to discourage Moscow from testing NATO's resolve has never been better.
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