Montenegro. About 600,000 people. One of them is Stefan Jovetic who used to play for Man City.
Can’t say we’d expect the average person to know much about the place. It used to be part of Yugoslavia back when Yugoslavia was a thing, and for a short while they shared a football team with Serbia.
They’re almost the most recent members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) — an organisation whose summit Donald Trump attended last week, controversially demanding that other participant nations increase their defence spending.
One of the most widely discussed elements of NATO since Trump took office is Article 5 of the Washington Treaty, which stipulates a promise of “collective defence” between all NATO nations. In effect, this means that if one NATO country was to be invaded, it could call on the military aid of all other NATO countries.
Trump has taken issue with this promise, and in an interview, he responded to Fox News’ Tucker Carlson’s question over why American soldiers should be sent to defend, for example, Montenegro. In true Trump fashion, the president took the opportunity to just kind of… freestyle on the idea of Montenegro for a few seconds.
““I understand what you’re saying. I’ve asked the same question. They’re very strong people, they’re very aggressive people. They may get aggressive and, congratulations, you’re in World War Three.”
The remarks have not been well-received in Montenegro. According to the BBC, former Montenegrin president Ranko Krivokapic said, “With this kind of president, with his knowledge of foreign policy, who knows what is going on? Foreign policy is not his big thing.”
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