Latvian Foreign Minister: Iran Strikes Reassured NATO and Were Good ‘Demonstration of Strength’

On Tuesday’s broadcast of CNN International’s “The Brief,” Latvian Minister of Foreign Affairs Baiba Braže stated that the American strikes on Iran has given NATO members reassurance that President Donald Trump will act militarily when he feels he needs to do so and there was also “the sheer power projection and the force of it, which was also very important as a demonstration of strength and a demonstration of the willingness to engage.”

Host Jim Sciutto asked, “So, first, I wonder what the reaction to the U.S. strikes on Iran has been at the NATO Summit there. And is it possible, to some degree, that those strikes give NATO allies some comfort that this President will take military action when he deems it necessary?”

Braže responded, “I think you hit the nail on the head, that’s one aspect of it all. Second was the sheer power projection and the force of it, which was also very important as a demonstration of strength and a demonstration of the willingness to engage. But also, we all know that all the theaters today are actually interconnected. It’s the Euro-Atlantic, but it’s also the Middle East, it’s also [the] Indo-Pacific, or Africa. There are aspects and interests everywhere. The fact is, [the U.S.’s] closest allies and friends are in Europe, and that is, I think, what President Trump will hear today, what he heard today already at the dinner, and, also, tomorrow at the summit itself.”

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