
Former US President Donald Trump agreed to keep Iceland in NATO for only one reason. This was reported by Zamin.uz.
The Guardian, citing NATO's former Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg's new book, provided this information. According to Stoltenberg, Iceland was kept in the alliance because it had an important capability to monitor Russian submarines.
Initially, Trump was skeptical about Iceland's participation in NATO because the country had no armed forces and its defense spending was less than two percent of its gross domestic product. Jim Mattis, who was the US Secretary of Defense from 2017 to 2019, managed to persuade Trump to reverse this decision.
He emphasized that NATO bases in Iceland played a crucial role in monitoring Russian underwater activities. Thus, Trump recognized Iceland's strategic importance to the alliance and agreed to keep it in the organization.
This decision played an important role in ensuring NATO's security.