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No other nation carries more weight for what Nato is than the United States. It maintains a distinct position among member states due to its diplomatic, financial and defense influence. Which is why the forces that influence American politics – and who is in the White House – are such critical factors. The vote for the presidency in November 2016 was therefore not only important to the US, but also to all of Nato.

For the first six months of 2016, Hillary Clinton was ahead in all surveys. By the end of summer, election experts were anticipating her victory. I, too, had a intuition this would be the result. On election night, my wife Ingrid and I planned a party with friends and colleagues at the residency in Brussels. We rigged up a large television in the living room, and hamburgers were served. A long day lay ahead, so I went to bed before midnight.

I got up at five and checked my phone. Donald Trump had secured Pennsylvania and Ohio. It still wasn’t 100% certain, but CNN had stated he was going to win. When I descended to our election breakfast at six o’clock, the others were evidently just as surprised as me.

I was worried about what would happen next, because I had seen how skeptical of Nato Trump had been during his election campaign. In a television interview towards the end of March, he had said “Nato is obsolete” – a view that weakened American foreign policy of the past 70 years. Trump received opposition from a number of Republican leaders, but it seemed to have no effect on him. At around the same time, he was asked who he would turn to when he needed foreign policy advice. “I’m speaking with myself, number one, because I have a very good brain,” he responded.

The American people had elected Trump, and we had to acknowledge that. I wanted Nato to develop a good working relationship with him as quickly as possible, in order to get him and his administration to take a more positive view of the alliance. Within Nato, restraint would be necessary. I made it clear exasperated groaning at internal meetings was not allowed. There would be no eye-rolling at Trump’s tweets or public appearances; no derisive laughter over videos; no jokes about golfing or his habits. Zero tolerance was essential. Just a small group of individuals poking fun can circulate through an organisation and leak. And should it reach Washington that Nato staff were sitting around laughing at Donald Trump, it would be disastrous.

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On Friday 18 November, I had Trump on the line for the first time. “I’m a massive fan of Nato! Great to speak with you, eager to working with you,” he said. During our conversation, I was a little shocked that we mostly seemed to see eye to eye on the crucial matters. Trump believed the European member states needed to spend more on defence. “On that I completely agree with you,” I said. Better burden sharing and increasing defence spending were what I had spent most of my time working on since taking office. Nato needed to be better ready in the fight against terror, Trump said. “On that I totally agree with you,” I responded again.

He also wanted to hear my opinions on the individuals he was evaluating for key positions. I was surprised, but I didn’t challenge him. Rex Tillerson for secretary of state? I knew him a little from the oil industry and from energy conferences in the 90s. “A good choice,” I said.

Jim Mattis for secretary of defense? The truth was, the little I knew about him came from the HBO series Generation Kill about the Iraq war, which I had watched with my son: Mattis is depicted as a mythic figure, a general both respected and looked up to, who goes by the call sign Chaos. There was a slightly embarrassing pause before Torgeir Larsen, who, as director of my private office, was on the call, handed me a note. It said: Jim Mattis is great. He knows Nato.

“Jim Mattis is great. He knows Nato,” I told Trump.

After that first conversation, I felt things looked more promising. Like many others, I disagreed with Trump’s views on climate change, abortion rights and trade policy, but the substance of what he had said about Nato in our conversation was something I could build on.

Shortly after the election, Barack Obama welcomed the future president to the White House. It was a diplomatic affair. Trump thanked him for his contributions; Obama said everything an outgoing president should.

This, too, I found encouraging. Things are going to calm down, I thought: now the election was over, Trump would be influenced by his new role and its responsibilities. With capable people around him, Trump would become more like his former presidents in the White House.

That was the second flawed assessment I made of Donald Trump.

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In mid-April 2017, I was at the White House, ready to meet Donald Trump for the first time. I had prepared a few polite remarks about the election victory and Melania, the first lady. The door opened to his office, but no president stood there waiting. Trump lounged casually in a chair.

“Come on in, guys,” he said, smiling.

When Trump had welcomed Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe a few weeks earlier, the handshake lasted 15 seconds, and was so strong Abe grimaced. Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau was subjected to similar treatment. A little later, French president Emmanuel Macron chose to hold so hard, his knuckles turned white. All this had been much discussed, with some commentators believing Trump was trying to demonstrate his authority through his handshake and others pointing out he was concerned with his tough image. Not long before my visit, he had met German chancellor Angela Merkel, and declined to shake her hand in front of the photographers. Much was written about that, too.

When Trump got up, hand extended, I was a little apprehensive. But his grip turned out to be almost disappointingly normal, neither hard nor loose.

To the script from which Trump was reading, a few words had been added in thick black marker: ‘MUST PAY’ and ‘NOT FAIR’

When the conversation began, however, it quickly became apparent this was going to be extremely informal. We switched from one topic to the next. Talking about Russia, Trump suddenly declared, “But why can’t you guys in Nato join us in Korea? They’re building nuclear weapons, and that’s something we can’t accept.”

A couple of months earlier, North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un, had stated that preparations for the testing of an intercontinental nuclear missile were now in their last phase; this announcement was followed by the launching of medium-range missiles, which landed in the Sea of Japan. So Trump mentioning North Korea wasn’t completely surprising. But I was uncertain as to what he meant. Did he want Nato to take action in North Korea?

“Mr President, all the allies are anxious about the nuclear weapons, but I don’t think there will be any support for bombing North Korea,” I said.

“But you’re in Afghanistan. Why can’t you be in North Korea?” he answered, before the conversation quickly moved on. We discussed terrorism and Islamic State, of course, with Trump saying, “We have to kill them, we have to bomb them, they’re really bad people.”

Soon our conversation returned to Russia, and I restated the points I had been eager to make since taking office in Nato. “We must be strong and predictable, but be open to maintaining a conversation with Russia. Russia is here to stay. It’s a adjacent country, not a terrorist organisation that needs to be eradicated, like IS,” I said.

Then, as I had done in many other conversations, I cited Norway’s experiences. “You know, Mr President, as former prime minister of Norway, I know that it’s possible to speak with the Russians.”

Trump gave a questioning look. “Are you Norwegian?”

I understood why he was asking – over the years I’ve hosted many heads of organisations myself, and it isn’t always easy to remember where each comes from. I smiled. “Yes, I’m Norwegian.”

“Do you know Celina Midelfart?”

“Yes, I’ve met her several times. She’s a well-known person in Norway,” I replied.

“Nice girl. What they wrote about us in the Norwegian papers – was it good or bad?”

I remembered seeing newspaper images of Trump and the Norwegian cosmetics heiress and investor at some sporting event or other, but more than that I couldn’t recall. I had no idea what the papers had said.

“Oh yes, the reporting was positive. She’s married to a rich Norwegian now,” I said.

“He’s not rich.”

So the president of the United States clearly knew who investor Tor Olav Trøim was. But were you rich if you had a few billion kroner to your name? Perhaps not, in Donald Trump’s eyes.

After about 20 minutes, our private conversation was over. Trump’s staff and several members of my delegation joined us. I noticed my colleagues looking on worriedly as Trump and I shook hands once more for the photographers. But everyone was deprived out of a potentially amusing anecdote.

For Trump, the most important issue was Nato members’ defence spending. I wanted him to take a more supportive view of the alliance and had brought along a graph that showed spending was increasing. Trump was most preoccupied with the fact that only five member states had met the goal of spending 2% of GDP on defence. I pointed out that several countries were approaching, and six or seven likely to reach the target in the near future. Then there was Iceland: it has no armed forces, so would never spend 2% of its GDP on defence. It was therefore actually five out of 27 countries who had achieved the goal, rather than five out of 28, I said, thinking I may be coming across as rather detailed with all these figures.

But this caught Trump’s interest, if not in the way I had intended. “Then what do we want with Iceland?”

Before I could say anything further, Jim Mattis came to my assistance, explaining how important Nato’s bases there were for the alliance’s submarines, ships and planes: “Mr President, they’re good to have if you want to find Russian subs.” Trump thought for a moment. “Well, then we’ll let Iceland stay a member,” he said.

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In Nato, we never use the red carpet – we roll out a blue one. On Thursday 25 May 2017, we rolled out an very long, very wide bright blue carpet, all the way from the main entrance to the road leading to Nato HQ. The blue was represented in the colour of our flag, which stands for the Atlantic Ocean, around which the alliance is assembled. Everything was ready for a important ceremony with Nato heads of state and government in attendance.

On this day,