The 36th NATO heads of state summit concluded in Ankara, Turkey, on Wednesday with a landmark package of commitments: €70 billion in military assistance to Ukraine for 2026, a pledge to maintain equivalent or higher support in 2027, a reaffirmation of Article 5 collective defence by all 32 member states including the United States, and a commitment to reach 5% of GDP in defence spending by 2035.
But the summit also exposed a significant and unresolved transatlantic friction — President Trump arrived in Ankara frustrated that European allies had declined to participate in Operation Epic Fury, the US-Israeli military campaign against Iran, and left without having received a commitment that they would. The Ankara Declaration may be the most financially significant in NATO’s history. The political dynamics it revealed are among the most challenging the alliance has faced.
What the Summit Committed To
NATO members are set to pledge €70 billion in military assistance to Ukraine for 2026 and “at least equivalent levels” of support in 2027, according to the Ankara Declaration. The declaration reaffirmed NATO’s “ironclad commitment” to collective defence under Article 5 — which commits all members to treat an attack on one as an attack on all. This language was significant given Trump’s earlier questions about US commitment to collective defence.
The summit confirmed the 5% of GDP defence spending target by 2035 — a target agreed ahead of the summit that represents the most ambitious spending commitment in the alliance’s history. In 2025, European allies and Canada increased their core defence investment by $139 billion in nominal terms, with all allied defence budgets now meeting at least the 2% benchmark for the first time since the figure was established in 2014.
Ukraine will sign major defence deals with at least seven NATO countries by the end of 2026, according to a senior official. The US has sold over $6 billion of US-made systems, including Patriot air defence missiles, to NATO allies who have then provided those to Ukraine.
Zelensky attended the summit and held a private meeting with Trump. The Ukrainian president focused his public statements on the Patriot interceptor shortage, saying: “We are asking President Trump, his team… rush.” He said the pace of Patriot transfers was “too slow” relative to the scale of Russian ballistic missile attacks — a point made dramatically real by Monday night’s attack, in which all 29 Russian ballistic missiles struck their targets unimpeded.
The Iran Rift — Europe’s Non-Participation in Operation Epic Fury
Beneath the formal commitments and carefully worded communiqué language, the summit was shaped by a significant and publicly acknowledged tension between Trump and his European counterparts. President Donald Trump arrived at the NATO summit frustrated with European allies over their refusal to support Operation Epic Fury against Iran, opening a new burden-sharing fight.
European leaders — including France, Germany, the UK and Italy — declined to participate in the US-Israeli military campaign that began on February 28. From Trump’s perspective, the Iran war was a collective burden that the United States and Israel bore alone while European NATO allies benefited from the strategic effects of degrading Iran’s military capacity and partially restoring Hormuz shipping without contributing to the effort.
European leaders’ position is that they were not consulted on the decision to launch Operation Epic Fury, that the campaign’s strategic rationale and international legal basis were contested, and that participation would have exposed their countries to Iranian retaliation without having been parties to the decision to attack.
The Ankara Declaration text navigated this tension through careful language — describing Russia as “the most significant and direct threat to allied security” without formally addressing the Iran campaign or European non-participation. Italy, in particular, had been blocking language that European officials said risked implicitly endorsing military action the alliance as a whole had not approved.
The Zelensky-Trump Meeting
Trump and Zelensky met privately on the summit’s sidelines. Trump told reporters after the meeting that he thought an end to the Ukraine war was “getting close” — language that caused anxiety in Kyiv about whether a US-brokered settlement might be imposed over Ukraine’s objections. Zelensky, speaking separately, was more measured, saying Ukraine needed to be part of any peace process and could not accept conditions imposed without its participation.
The Patriot interceptor gap — the single most urgent operational military need Zelensky raised publicly — was not resolved at the summit. The US acknowledged the shortage, pointed to the transfer mechanisms already in place, and reiterated its commitment. Whether that translates into the accelerated production and delivery of interceptors that Ukraine’s air defence commanders say they need to stop ballistic missile attacks remains to be seen.
Turkey’s Strategic Gains
The summit’s host extracted significant value from the gathering. Erdogan held bilateral talks with Trump, during which the two leaders discussed Turkey’s long-standing request for F-35 fighter jets — blocked since Turkey purchased the Russian S-400 air defence system. Trump signalled openness to addressing the F-35 question, though no formal announcement was made.
Turkey has been developing its own defence industrial base, including the KAAN stealth fighter jet and Bayraktar drone systems, and used the summit to showcase its military technology to a captive audience of allied defence ministers and industry leaders.
The choice of Ankara as the summit venue — which Human Rights Watch criticised as legitimising Erdogan’s consolidation of power — produced the expected communiqué language affirming democratic values while the Turkish government continued to arrest opposition mayors and detain journalists.
What the Summit Left Unresolved
Despite the historic financial commitments, the Ankara summit left several critical questions unanswered. The Patriot interceptor shortage remains acute, with production rates insufficient to simultaneously supply Ukraine and the Gulf allies defending against Iranian drone and missile attacks. Ukraine’s path to NATO membership — a question that Zelensky has pressed repeatedly — produced no new commitments, with Italy and several other members maintaining their position that formal membership discussions should await the conclusion of the war.
The Iran rift between Trump and European allies has not been bridged, and the question of how NATO collectively responds to the Strait of Hormuz crisis — a challenge with direct implications for European energy security — was not formally addressed in the Ankara Declaration.
The alliance that emerged from Ankara is better funded, more unified on paper and more visibly committed to Ukraine’s defence than at any previous point in Trump’s second term. Whether the commitments made in Ankara on July 7 and 8 translate into the physical capabilities, political cohesion and strategic clarity that the challenges of 2026 require will be the test of the next twelve months.
