US ambassador quits 'over Trump comments'
The US ambassador to Estonia is resigning, reportedly in frustration at remarks made by President Donald Trump about America's European allies.
James D Melville said Mr Trump's comments on Nato and the EU had brought forward his decision to retire, Foreign Policy magazine reports.
The magazine was quoting from a private Facebook post by the envoy.
Mr Trump accuses Europeans of unfairly expecting America to shoulder the costs of the Nato alliance.
He has also imposed trade tariffs on some EU industries.
Other US diplomats left their posts early in recent months:
Imagine having to work for such a pig ?
Trump has very valid points.
Our NATO Allies are screwing over the American Taxpayers by not paying for their share for their defense.
European countries are who started the tariffs.
Once again Trump is not the bad guy. He is just trying to make things fair.
How are they screwing over the American Taxpayers?
The US CHOOSES to spend a massive amount on defense.
The spends a lot of money, but on what?
Int he 1990s defense spending was down below $500 billion a year. Bush pumped this up to over $750 billion a year because of Afghanistan and Iraq. Attacking wars, not defensive wars.
Can we say the US was spending 1/3rd of their budget on Iraq?
Apparently $2.4 trillion had been spent on the Iraq war by 2017, that's 14 years which is $171 billion a year. Along with Afghanistan that's at LEAST 1/3 of the budget.
This takes the US's 3.1% of GDP down to 2% of GDP at least and doesn't include operations in other countries that have nothing to do with defense.
France spends more than 2% of GDP.
Trump complains, but he has to see that the countries with the highest defense spending in the EU, the French and British, are the ones who do the most warring. Along side the US.
This isn't about defense at all.