VOA常速英语:Trump’s Challenge: The Powerful Women of NATO(翻译)

Trump stunned the alliance and defense analysts when he told The New York Times the US would defend NATO members against Russian aggression only if they paid their fair share in contributions to the alliance.

“Donald Trump and what he represents with respect to NATO, in particular, is dangerous.He is going straight at the heart of the alliance and even the idea of calling that into dispute, I think, terrifies a lot of,particularly the eastern European countries.”

But analysts like Cheng say it is not only his stance on NATO that gets the president-elect off to a shaky start with alliance members.His disrespectful remarks about women during the campaign could make for some awkward encounters with NATO’s heavy hitters,including British’s Theresa May and Germany’s Angela Merkel.

“I think that Mrs. May and Mrs. Merkel will be extremely professional and cordial. Having said that, it is difficult to imagine, as a woman,how one could overlook the things that he has said and the things that he has done.”

“To confront Donald Trump is going to be moving into meeting some different,a very different world, not quite a different planet, but certainly a different world.”

But there is general agreement that Trump, May, and Merkel have one thing in common:They are all business when it matters.

“I think Mrs. Merkel, who in some ways I think is much more of a European than Theresa May is,I think she’s going to regard Donald Trump as a kind of United States phenomenon,in a way which just says this country, this extraordinarily rich and vital country,produces all kinds of ideas and people who are extraordinary in European terms.”

What does extraordinary president electoral mean for NATO will be seen in the month to come.

Luis Ramirez, VOA news, London