Benham Ben Taleblu
speaker
26 appearances
1 recordings
1 series
first heard Jul 2026
last heard 8 Jul
Benham Ben Taleblu’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 1 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 1.
Appearances
I was very disappointed with NATO.
And frankly, if it weren't held in Turkey, it's possible that I wouldn't have attended.
Surely he made his presence felt, but also Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan went quite out of his way to make Trump feel welcome, stylistically and substantively.
Certainly, the Turks wanted something from the U.S.
The big question that was dangled here was over sanctions relief or the prospect of waiving sanctions, sanctions which, by the way, are congressionally mandated.
pursuant to older legislation which the Trump administration actually enforced in term one previously as it related to the S-400 purchase, the strategic air defense system that the Turks had purchased.
And so I think any NATO member
is a bit shaky today, despite the plussing up of some of their defense commitments because of the prospects of waiving sanctions on Turkey, despite the lingering presence of this Russian air defense system.
Well, the kind of persistent threats about the future of NATO, there's a little bit more meat on the bone here than just the kind of panic in Washington whenever the Trump administration, like previous administrations, by the way, chastises the Europeans for not meeting their defense commitments.
Those defense commitments have been things that the European politicians have promised NATO.
to meet in terms of defense spending, in terms of evolving military applications and capabilities of this alliance.
But ultimately, this entire meeting is happening against the backdrop of at least a six-month policy review about the future of the U.S.
force posture in Europe under NATO auspices.
The President is trying to at least make good on some of his threats when it comes to the future of U.S.
forces in Europe and the strategic direction of the Transatlantic Alliance, which certainly implicates NATO.
You know, call me crazy, but I see a lot of this as public bargaining, just like I see a lot of the president's rhetoric, or hopefully the president's rhetoric about, you know, waiving sanctions as bargaining, trying to see if there's room to go soft so that he doesn't have to go hard later.
on some country that he believes is a NATO partner, a NATO ally, and a potential US strategic partner in the Middle East.
But ultimately here, I don't think the president is going to be doing a 180 when it comes to the style of his criticism of NATO.
Substantively though, I do think there will be more continuity than change when it comes to the future.
of U.S.-European relations and of U.S.-NATO relations.
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