Trump: America won’t support NATO because of their refusal to send military support to secure the Strait of Hormuz

US President Donald Trump on Friday again expressed his displeasure with NATO allies for refusing to send military support to secure the Strait of Hormuz, saying Washington might not help them if asked.

“They simply didn’t exist,” he said at an economic conference in Miami.

“We spend hundreds of billions of dollars a year on NATO, hundreds of billions, to protect them, and we would always be on their side, but now, based on their actions, I think we’re not obligated to do that, right?” he said.

“Why are we there for them if they aren’t there for us?” he added.

In recent weeks, the US president has stepped up his rhetoric towards US NATO allies as cowards, saying in a post on Truth Social that NATO without the US is a paper tiger.

“We’re very disappointed with NATO, because it has done nothing at all,” he said Thursday during a meeting at the White House.

Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the Netherlands said in a joint statement on March 19th that they were ready to contribute to appropriate efforts to ensure safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz, but ruled out any direct military intervention.

Since the outbreak of the war in the Middle East following attacks by the United States and Israel on Iran on February 28, Tehran has effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of global oil production in addition to natural gas usually passes, leading to a sharp rise in fuel prices.

In his speech in Miami to company executives and investors at the FII Priority Summit, Trump stressed Friday that the military operation against Iran, which enters its fifth week, is going well.