Meanwhile, Rubio headed back to Washington after scrapping his planned final press conference, something that the U.S. delegation said was due to a scheduling change.
Despite those discordant notes, foreign ministers continued to insist that the alliance is still functioning.
“We all understand and feel the profound change in the international relations and in this situation the Czech policy is to keep America as much as possible involved in European security,” Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský told POLITICO. “NATO presence is one of the unique tools to do so.”
Other officials underlined that they were meeting Trump’s demand to increase their military budgets.
“At a time of significant security challenges, first things come first — we are of course prioritizing security and defense,” said Latvian Foreign Minister Baiba Braže, whose country aims to raise its defense spending to 5 percent of GDP by 2028.
Rutte seized on those voices.
“We will invest more. Much more,” he said in his final news briefing.
Laura Kayali contributed reporting from Paris.
