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You really can't break down what is the U.S spending in defense of Europe as opposed to what is the U.S spending in spending to advance its own interest globally.

That's nearly impossible to do. You're listening to War College, a weekly podcast that brings you the stories from behind the front lines.

Here are your hosts, Matthew Galt. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, otherwise known as NATO, is nearly 70 years old.

It was created after World War II during the Cold War.

It faced off against a Soviet-led block called the Warsaw Pact.

Now many of those Warsaw Pact nations are part of NATO.

The United States is tugging at the threads of the Alliance.

President Trump is accusing allies of freeloading off the United States.

So what's the real state of NATO?

Kathleen Hicks is here to help us to get to the bottom of it.

She's the director of International Security Program at the

Center for Strategic and International Studies. Thanks for joining us.

Happy to be here. If we can just start off with the most basic thing of all, what is NATO's central mission?

Sure.

Well, first of all, NATO, as you said, was formed at the end of World War II. So in its earliest origins,

it did have a strong focus on bringing Europe

in a united way into a more liberal or democratic period of time following, you know, the destruction of Europe during

...