President Trump's announcement, which followed a dramatic live confrontation in the White House on Feb 28, 2025 with Ukrainian Prime Minister Vladimir Zelenskyy, that the American President would suspend all aid to Ukraine, caused shock waves around the world.

This was followed by President Trump's declaration that the United States would no longer pay disproportionately for Europe's defense in NATO, and that he would not defend his NATO allies if they did not pay their fair share. "'"It's common sense, right," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. "If they don't pay, I'm not going to defend them. No, I'm not going to defend them."'

The President's supporters, especially those in the United States, cheered these moves. They object to what looks at times like a global shell game that enriches all who collude with it, with this collusion coming at the cost, as the President pointed out, of two thousand Russian and Ukrainian soldiers' lives a week. These Americans see our refusal to overpay for our role in NATO as being a long-overdue stop to a multi-billion-dollar, decades-long gravy train that has sustained, since 1949, what are in fact, now, wealthy societies.