Trump is Furious with Italy

She was supposed to be his woman in Europe. The ideological soulmate. The one conservative leader on the continent who genuinely got along with Donald Trump, who cultivated the relationship, who positioned herself as Washington's indispensable bridge to a skeptical EU.

That was then.

This week, Giorgia Meloni - Prime Minister of Italy, former Trump favourite, suddenly Washington's problem - sat across from U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Rome's Palazzo Chigi and tried to hold together an alliance that has been visibly splintering for weeks. The cause of the rupture: Italy's refusal to open its military bases for the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran - and Meloni's decision to call Trump's attacks on the Pope "unacceptable."

Trump's response was characteristically blunt. "Italy wasn't there for us, we won't be there for them," he said in a phone interview with Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera. He added: "I am considering moving our troops from Italian bases."

Thirteen thousand American troops are currently stationed on Italian soil. The question of whether they stay has become one of the most charged diplomatic fault lines of the war.

The Moment It Broke: Sigonella

The immediate trigger was a Sicilian airbase.

Sigonella, one of the U.S. military's most strategically vital installations in the Mediterranean, sits just outside Catania. For decades it has served as a logistics hub for American operations across the Middle East. When the U.S. launched Operation Epic Fury on February 28 - the joint U.S.-Israeli air campaign that killed Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and ignited a regional war - Washington expected its allies to fall in line.

Italy didn't.

Rome declined to allow U.S. aircraft to use Sigonella for combat operations linked to the Iran conflict, with officials pointedly noting that Washington had not sought prior authorisation from Rome before requesting access. Italian Defence Minister Guido Crosetto - a close Meloni ally who has otherwise been careful to manage the bilateral relationship - was unambiguous: only if Rome authorises it can the United States use its bases in Italy for such a conflict. Italy's constitution, he noted, makes it constitutionally impossible for Italian troops to participate in a war that Rome has not sanctioned.

Trump was furious. Italy had crossed a line - not just operationally, but symbolically. Meloni, the one European leader he had trusted, had said no when it mattered most.

Then Came the Pope

A rupture over a military base might have been manageable. What followed made it personal.

Pope Leo XIV - the new pontiff, installed only last year - called publicly for an end to the Iran war and condemned the killing of civilians. Trump, who has never responded well to criticism from any quarter, lashed out. He called the Pope "weak on crime" and "terrible for foreign policy."

In a predominantly Catholic country, where the Vatican sits within the capital's city limits and the head of the Catholic Church commands a reverence that transcends politics, this landed like a grenade.

Meloni did not stay quiet. "I find President Trump's words regarding the Holy Father to be unacceptable," she said. "The Pope is the head of the Catholic Church, and it is right and normal that he should call for peace and condemn all forms of war."

Trump's rebuttal was swift and savage. He told Corriere della Sera that it was Meloni who was "unacceptable," accusing her of not caring "if Iran has a nuclear weapon." He said she had shown a "lack of courage" and had "let Washington down." And then the threat: troops out of Italy, under active consideration.

The Ultimatum - and the Numbers Behind It

The troop threat is not an empty flourish. The United States maintains approximately 13,000 military personnel in Italy, part of a total European footprint of around 68,000 active-duty troops spread across 31 permanent bases and 19 military sites. Germany hosts around 36,000; Spain around 4,000. All three countries have drawn Trump's ire over the Iran war.

Trump has already announced the withdrawal of 5,000 troops from Germany. When asked whether Italy and Spain faced the same fate, he told reporters: "Probably… Look, why shouldn't I? Italy has not been of any help to us and Spain has been horrible, absolutely horrible."

It is not, however, straightforward to execute. The 2026 National Defense Authorization Act - passed by the Senate last year - includes a provision barring the permanent reduction of U.S. troop levels in Europe below 75,000. Defense analysts point out that key infrastructure in Italy, particularly the logistics hubs that have sustained American military operations in the Middle East for decades, cannot simply be relocated. "Even the most willing European country would not be able to offer that in the short term," one analyst told Fox News.

Congress has also stepped in before. During Trump's first term, lawmakers successfully blocked a proposed withdrawal from Germany. A new push would almost certainly trigger fresh scrutiny on Capitol Hill, particularly given that any significant drawdown could complicate the Iran conflict itself - the very war Trump is fighting.

Meloni Walks a Tightrope - And Knows It

Meloni's position is, by any measure, one of the most difficult of her political career.

She has been one of Trump's most loyal European partners since his return to the White House. She cultivated the relationship deliberately, positioning herself as the natural interlocutor between Washington and a continent full of leaders Trump distrusts. It was a card she played skillfully. Now the war in Iran has forced her to choose between that relationship and something harder to ignore: Italian public opinion, Italy's constitution, the economic fallout of a conflict spiking fuel prices across Europe, and the moral authority of the Pope.

She has chosen not to choose - at least not openly.

Meloni has made clear Italy will not participate in the war. She suspended Italy's longstanding defence cooperation agreement with Israel in April. She has described the conflict as "one of the gravest international crises in decades" and warned that it reflects "a wider collapse of the global legal and diplomatic order." But she has also been careful not to sever the thread to Washington entirely.

When Trump threatened to pull the troops, Meloni did not escalate. She said she would not support such a move - but conceded, with studied calmness: "The decision doesn't depend on me." She has stood firm on Italy's NATO commitments, saying Rome "has always honoured the commitments it has undertaken within NATO." And her Defence Minister has tried to reframe Italy's contribution: Crosetto announced Italy is working within a coalition to prepare a Strait of Hormuz mission focused on mine clearance and the protection of maritime navigation - peace-keeping work, not war-fighting.

Rubio's visit to Rome this week was, in part, an attempt to stabilise the relationship. He met Meloni at Palazzo Chigi. He also visited Pope Leo at the Vatican, with the U.S. ambassador to the Holy See describing the encounter as a "frank conversation." Rubio called his meeting with the Pope "very positive." The damage-control operation is ongoing.

A Fracture Across Europe

Italy is not alone. The Iran war has cracked the transatlantic alliance in ways that few anticipated.

Spain denied the United States access to joint military bases and closed its airspace to U.S. aircraft involved in the conflict. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz - in unusually direct language for a NATO ally in wartime - called the U.S. "humiliated" by Iran, saying Washington had "no truly convincing strategy" and that the conflict was directly damaging the German economy. Trump responded by posting that Merz "thinks it's OK for Iran to have a Nuclear" - and threatened German troop withdrawals too.

The UK has been only marginally more diplomatic. Britain's top economic official accused Trump of entering the war "without a clear plan." Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he is "fed up" with British households suffering financial instability due to decisions made in Washington.

The EU's collective economic cost is staggering. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told the European Parliament: "In just 60 days of conflict, our bill for fossil fuel imports has increased by over €27 billion, without a single molecule of additional energy." Global oil prices have surged. The Strait of Hormuz - closed to most commercial traffic, handling barely 5% of its pre-war volumes - has stifled energy supply across the continent.

The Europeans, in other words, are paying an enormous price for a war they were never asked about, never consulted on, and were expected to simply support.

Meloni, for all the heat she is taking from Trump, may be the one European leader who has actually tried hardest to keep the door with Washington open - even as she refuses to walk through it on his terms.

What Comes Next

The Rubio visit bought some breathing room. Whether it bought enough depends on whether the ceasefire holds, whether the Strait reopens, and whether Trump's frustration with Europe continues to boil.

What is clear is that a relationship once described as the warmest between Washington and any European capital has been fundamentally altered. Meloni is no longer Trump's bridge to Europe. She is, right now, another obstacle - and a particularly awkward one, because unlike the leaders Trump has always despised, she was supposed to be one of his own.

Italy was not there when Trump needed it, he says.

What he may not have fully reckoned with is that the feeling, in Rome, is becoming mutual.