The Pentagon would analyze expelling Spain from NATO as punishment for its lack of support for the war against Iran

According to an e-mail that would be circulating internally by the Ministry of Defense – and to which the international news agency Reuters had access -, Donald Trump’s government is analyzing options to “punish” to those member countries of the NATO defensive alliance that expressed their opposition to the latest chapter of the war that the United States and Israel began against Iran at the end of February.

Spain never hid its opposition to attacks in the Middle East: denied the US planes and navy the use of the bases of Rota, in Cádiz, and Morón de la Frontera, in Seville, and closed their airspace.

Created during the Cold War, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is a defensive military-political association of 32 countries where each member is on equal terms and no ally can be expelled or suspended.

There is an article of the Treaty, article 13, that contemplates voluntary departure from the alliance.

“We do not work on e-mails, we work on official documents and positions made, in this case, by the United States government,” President Pedro Sánchez said this Friday from Nicosia, in Cyprus, where he is participating in an informal summit of the twenty-seven countries that make up the European Union.

“The position of the Spanish government is clear: absolute collaboration with allies, but always within the framework of international legality – Sánchez insisted -. There is no debate. We comply with our obligations. We are a loyal partner.”

During this first day of the meeting of European leaders in Cyprus, Sánchez insisted that the European Union must suspend its association agreement with Israel which, since 2000, has maintained an industrial free trade area between both parties.

“There are governments that are in favor, other governments that are against. There is no unity in this regard and what the result of all this leads us to is a weakening of the positions of the European Union in our legitimacy, at least politically, and in our credibility when it comes to defending causes as just as that of Ukraine,” Sánchez said.

“Europe is a peace project, it is a multilateral project – he insisted -. We are the ones who have to defend that international order.”

The Pentagon’s communications secretary, Kingsley Wilson, supported the United States’ discomfort with the position of Spain and the rest of the countries that do not support the war in the Middle East: “The War Department will ensure that President Trump has credible options to guarantee that allies stop being a paper tiger and do their part,” Wilson threatened.

According to specialists in international politics, the Trump administration’s retaliation towards those allies that it considers are not up to par with its military incursions would be more symbolic than effective.

The United States could block access to certain positions or delay decisions that could affect Spain, such as withdrawing its support for Spanish sovereignty over the autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla and accommodating the claim that Morocco makes to Spain over those two cities on African soil.

Against the United Kingdom, for example, the United States would propose ceasing to maintain British sovereignty over the Malvinas Islands.

Donald Trump’s antipathy for the progressive coalition government of Pedro Sánchez already has several chapters and threats from the American president that are later revealed as unlikely to be realized by the legal and legal frameworks that protect international relations from any personal abruptness.

“I think they are not cooperating at all. I think they have behaved very badly, very badly. Maybe we will cut off trade with Spain,” Donald Trump said in March, before the lack of Spanish support for their incursions into Iran.

Spain responded that the trade agreement that the United States maintains is with the European Union and not with a specific country.

“I am very dissatisfied with Spain,” Trump had already said in October last year when the Sánchez government refused to increase defense spending to contribute to NATO to 5 percent of its Gross Domestic Product.

“Spain is extremely disrespectful towards NATO,” the American insisted and once again threatened with tariff retaliation.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) emerged in Washington on April 4, 1949. The founding nucleus was made up of the United States, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, Norway, the Netherlands, Portugal and the United Kingdom. They promised to defend each other. Spain joined in 1982.

The Rota naval base, in Cádiz, and the Morón de la Frontera air base, in Seville, are strategic for the United States.

Due to its location, Rota is key for US maritime incursions in the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea.

Morón de la Frontera, for its part, is a crucial support point for Trump’s aviation on missions to Africa and the Persian Gulf.