NATO tensions are ‘growing pains,’ U.S. ambassador says as Trump presses allies

Tensions within NATO over the Trump administration's campaign to pressure allies on defense spending reflect "growing pains" rather than a crisis, the U.S. ambassador to the alliance told CNBC on Monday. "The target is that Europe takes over the conventional defense of the European continent," he said. "We're not going away, we're just doing less," Matthew Whitaker said about the U.S. involvement in European defense and security, ahead of the crucial NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey. Whitaker said he saw current tensions around European governments' defense spending as "growing pains." "I see these as just the challenges that we've worked through before," he said, highlighting uneven defense spending by European countries, including what he referred to as "laggards" that will have to commit to growing that number over the next decade. At last year's NATO Summit in The Hague, the Netherlands, allies agreed on a defense spending target of 5% of GDP by 2035, including 3.5% on core defense spending. It was widely seen as a breakthrough for the transatlantic alliance, and came after years of pressure from Washington. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has said that the task ahead is "to turn Allied commitments into concrete results," as world leaders meet in Ankara on Tuesday and Wednesday.