Most European leaders have tiptoed around Trump’s war with Iran. Not Spain’s PM

By Tim Lister, CNN

(CNN) — Most European leaders have trodden a fine line between offering limited support for US military action against Iran and warning of a regional conflagration.

Not Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez. He has been outspoken in his criticism of US strikes, provoking anger and threats from the White House. But rather than back down, Sánchez and his government have doubled down.

Spain has significant trade and investment ties with the United States and a fellow member of NATO. Last year 4 million Americans visited the country. And just this month, Amazon said it would expand its investment in data centers in Spain to total nearly $40 billion.

The US also has major military facilities in southern Spain, at Rota and Morón. It’s the employment of those bases that kicked off the latest spat, with the Spanish government forbidding their use in support of the Iran strikes.

In angry comments at a news conference Tuesday, Trump threatened to cut off trade with Spain. And he added: “We could use their base if we want, we could just fly in and use it, nobody’s going to tell us not to use it.”

Sánchez did just that. Within 24 hours of Trump’s tirade, he went on national television with a simple message: “No to war.”

He described the US and Israeli strikes as “reckless and illegal” and said his country would “not be complicit in something that is bad for the world – and that is also contrary to our values and interests – simply out of fear of reprisals from someone.”

Sánchez accused the US of playing “Russian roulette with the destiny of millions.”

But he went further, arguing that leaders had a duty to make people’s lives better and taking an implicit dig at Trump. “It is absolutely unacceptable that those leaders who are incapable of fulfilling that duty use the smoke of war to hide their failures and, in the process, line the pockets of a few,” he said.

When the White House said its trade threat had forced ⁠Spain to agree to cooperate with the US military, the claim was swiftly contradicted.

Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares said Madrid’s position “on the war in the Middle East ‌and the bombing of Iran, regarding the use of our bases, has not changed at all.”

Europe’s minefield

Trump made his threats against Spain during a meeting at the White House with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who looked on in silence – itself eloquent testimony to yet another dilemma for Europe in dealing with Trump.

Over the past year many European leaders have tried to assuage Trump with a combination of flattery and accommodation, while drawing occasional red lines, such as with the American designs on Greenland, an autonomous Danish territory.

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said at one point of Trump: “Daddy has to sometimes use strong language.”

This time round, it’s about whether Europe will allow bases on its territory to be used in support of US strikes.

Trump praised Germany and Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni for being cooperative. He told an Italian newspaper Saturday: “I love Italy, I think she is a great leader.”

Not so much the United Kingdom’s Keir Starmer.

The UK initially turned down Washington’s request to use British bases to bomb Iran, before Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the UK would allow the US to use its bases for “defensive operations.”

The concession didn’t do him much good in Trump’s eyes.

“This is not Winston Churchill that we’re dealing with,” Trump said of Starmer. And on Saturday, responding to news that the UK would send an aircraft carrier to the Mediterranean, Trump posted on social media: “We don’t need people that join Wars after we’ve already won!”

Sánchez, by contrast, has at least been consistent, as well as a consistent irritant to Trump on multiple issues, including Greenland, relations with China and defense spending.

“I don’t know what’s going on with Spain; it seems they want to travel for free,” Trump said in January after Sánchez refused to raise defense spending targets to 5% of GDP by 2035, in line with the pledges of other NATO members.

“Spain has tripled its defense spending since I became prime minister,” Sánchez retorted.

For Sánchez, a spat with Trump may be risky, but it may also be smart politics, shoring up center-left support for his fragile coalition government.

Sánchez “is using foreign policy to regain the political initiative at home,” said Paco Camas García, of public survey firm Ipsos, posting on X. “The international stage allows him to project a sense of leadership and strategic clarity,” and it also puts the conservative Popular Party “in a particularly difficult bind.”

Camas García notes that Trump’s popularity in Spain is at an all-time low – just 16% according to one survey conducted in February – and that if the opposition “harshly critique Sánchez’s stance, they risk appearing to side with a US president whom their own base largely rejects.”

Sánchez is well aware that his Socialist party’s opposition to the Iraq war “was central to its victory in the 2004 elections,” as Chatham House noted this week. Indeed, Sánchez has compared the current US campaign with the Iraq war.

Trade matters

Economically, Trump’s threats to Spain – Europe’s fourth largest economy – may not be as grievous as they sound. Spain is one of Europe’s most vibrant economies, and only about 5% of Spain’s trade is with the US. The European Union would be duty bound to defend any member singled out for discrimination.

But Spain is reliant on the US for much of its liquefied natural gas supply.

There is another dimension to Sanchez’s hostility toward American influence. For years he and his family have been the targets of abuse on social media, and he has railed against US tech firms for not doing enough to combat hate speech.

“The social media that was supposed to bring unity, clarity and democracy have instead given us division, vice and a reactionary agenda,” Sánchez said in January, announcing that Spain would ban social media for children under the age of 16.

Now in his eighth year as Spain’s prime minister, Sánchez appears no longer to worry about confronting “Daddy” or the broader MAGA movement.

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