Name: Politicians react as Trump claims Nato troops avoided front lines | BBC Question Time
Uploaded: 2026-01-23T17:13:12.000Z
Duration: 13 min 59 s
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How dare he say we weren't on the front line?

Why are we still fostering a special relationship with Donald Trump in the US when his recent actions prove that he can't be trusted?

It's been pretty lively this week, hasn't it, with Donald Trump?

Greg, I'm going to come to you first because I think you probably have a greater understanding or certainly sympathy with Donald Trump's position.

You know, we've had a week where he's threatened to take over Greenland, he's threatened to impose tariffs, he's insulted NATO allies.

I just want to tell you about something he's also said this evening about NATO allies.

In an interview with Fox News, he talked about NATO not coming to help the United States if it needed them.

They say they sent some troops to Afghanistan and this or that, and they did.

They stayed a little back, a little off the front lines.

And look, the president is very unfiltered and often doesn't have his facts perfectly lined up.

We all know that not only was the UK Fighting alongside of us in both of those wars, but

And so, in fact, the percentage of casualties for Denmark was as high as the United States.

But to the question, of course he can be trusted.

I think the president wants a stronger NATO and in many respects alongside the Russia, Ukraine, Ukraine conflict that I think inspired the Europeans to step it up.

It's just that President Obama wasn't able to get any reaction and, and

encourage the Europeans to step up defense spending.

And the president's been successful with that.

I mean, you have Denmark, for example, at 3%.

You might not like how he, he behaves or how he gets, you know, how he makes the argument.

And so in this case, you know, obviously a mistake on the reference to Afghanistan and Iraq, but

the outcome is that we'll have a stronger NATO, whether that's because we have more defense mechanisms in Greenland or you have all the countries in NATO, all the European countries committing to 5% of GDP.

Whether they get there is a different argument.

Emily, what do you make of that comment by Donald Trump?

It's an insult to 457 families who lost someone in Afghanistan.

How dare he say we weren't on the front line.

Whenever the Americans have wanted us, we have always been there.

I went out to the United States at the beginning of the year and I had.

I had supper with a lot of Republicans who, to be quite honest, I didn't exactly expect to get on with and have a great deal to do with.

But the one thing that was clearly there, there was a genuine affection for the United Kingdom because they understood they were all milit military men and they knew that whenever they had been fighting, they had been fighting alongside someone from Britain who had been there to support the United States and be involved in action with the United States.

How dare this man, who's never seen any action, who somehow or other, when there was a draft for everybody else in the United States, managed to avoid it, and

yet now is Commander in Chief and knows nothing about how it is that America has been defended.

I mean, seriously, it's an absolute insult.

We've had a very shocking few days where we have had the leader of Britain's most important ally, you know, with whom we do have a close relationship in terms of defence, in terms of security, strong economic relationship, cultural, historic, you know, America's our friends, but

we have had a leader of that country who has behaved in a way which is.

Which is bullying, which is rude, which has been deliberately trying to undermine us, which has been trying to undermine NATO.

I'm really proud that we have, is we have stood, we have linked arms with our other friends and nations and we have said no.

You are not going to be involved in military action.

You are not going to breach international law.

Yeah, I'm not sure that he will react to those threats or whatever you want to describe them as.

Okay, but do you think NATO will be stronger because of Donald Trump?

I don't think that NATO is being Stronger because I think the idea of the most important member of NATO saying that it's going to take on NATO and it's going to invade one of the NATO countries undermines us.

Now we've pulled it back from the brink, thank goodness.

And actually, what, what I'm most, most pleased about is that it, at least it helps Ukraine, because what we don't want is NATO splintering because it does not help a country like Ukraine for NATO at a moment like this to be splintered in this way.

But, you know, I'm not going to, I'm not going to pretend that there is that Donald Trump has done anything other than behave in a thoroughly reckless way.

So you don't think NATO will be stronger at the end of the.

I was talking to the German ambassador yesterday, and

I said at least one thing that comes out of this is that it helps the smaller nations of NATO to remember that we need to stick together and we need to take more responsibility.

Let's hear from the man in the dark blue sweater with a white shirt then.

I'm very disappointed to hear that Donald Trump said that about people like myself who served in Iraq.

And so this, this idea that, well, he talked about Afghanistan, actually

but the idea that British troops were holding back from the front line, I can promise you I was very close to that front line.

I crossed over the border on the first day of the war and I saw things I don't want to see ever again.

I think Mr. Trump has just upset all veterans now.

Yes, man here in the front, in the middle.

Trump is wrong about this, but he's not wrong about NATO underspend.

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Politicians react as Trump claims Nato troops avoided front lines | BBC Question Time

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