Describing Israel and Iran fighting each other at his NATO pre-summit news conference in The Hague this week, US President Donald Trump drew an analogy with children fighting in a schoolyard, who eventually had to be separated.
“Daddy has to sometimes use strong language,” Mark Rutte, NATO secretary-general, chimed in.
Asked about the comment after the summit, Trump said: “No, he likes me. I think he likes me. If he doesn’t I’ll let you know. I’ll come back and hit him hard, OK? He did it very affectionately. Hey Daddy. You’re my Daddy.”
The White House decided Rutte was flattering the US president, and made a reel of Trump’s visit to the Netherlands, set to the music of Usher’s Hey Daddy.
Rutte’s flattery of Trump didn’t stop there. On tackling the Russia-Ukraine war, Rutte told reporters before the NATO summit: “When he came in office, he started the dialogue with President Putin, and I always thought that was crucial. And there’s only one leader who could break the deadlock originally, and it had to be the American president, because he is the most powerful leader in the world.”
But how sincere are world leaders’ statements about Donald Trump? Do they genuinely serve to improve bilateral relations and does flattery work?
Neither Rutte, nor any other European leader, engaged in any kind of dialogue with Russian President Vladimir Putin for a long time after the summer of 2022, the year of his invasion of Ukraine, believing it pointless.
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