Skip the World Cup, kick America out of NATO, and more: Dutch experts call to “Boycott USA”

Authorities and experts in the Netherlands are beginning to realise… We don’t need the United States of America. 

“Throw the USA out of NATO!”, “Blacklist FIFA!”, “Stop exporting semiconductors to the States!” These are some of the sentiments spreading across Dutch media this week. 

Renowned Dutch voices are speaking up against America, following Trump’s aggressive threat of an additional 10% tariff on all European nations sending troops to Greenland.

The Netherlands, being one of them, is outraged. 

And since Trump still can’t seem to grasp that Greenland isn’t a piece of real estate up for grabs from Denmark, here is how the Netherlands are actually responding, according to AD. 

A call to kick the US out of NATO

While McDonald’s has already snuck its way into every corner of the globe, according to the experts, the real issue isn’t just America’s cultural omnipresence. It’s the fact that we’ve allowed one orange man to bend international law to his every whim.

Rob de Wijk, a geopolitics columnist for Trouw, has urged European NATO members to expel the United States from the alliance.

Calling Trump’s leadership in NATO “useless,” the writer rallied for the now-former European allies to regroup. 

Critical of Europe’s dependence on America, de Wijk wrote: “I constantly hear the mantra that we can’t do without America. Nonsense. It’s a matter of will.”

Stop selling ASML chips to the US

Similarly, the former Commander of the Dutch Armed Forces, Dick Berlijn, rallied for a more strategic approach. 

“I think Europe needs to be more vocal about our position,” Berlijn tells NRC. “For example, ASML should no longer be allowed to supply American companies.”

ASML is a Dutch tech giant that holds a near-monopoly on the lithography machines essential for making the world’s most advanced microchips. 

Boycott the World Cup 

Over the weekend, Bernard Welten, former chief commissioner of Amsterdam, wrote a LinkedIn post calling to boycott the World Cup, which is to be held in the US next summer. 

Now a member of the police’s scientific advisory board, Welten advocates for a symbolic action because “silence is no longer a neutral position.” 

Welten is sounding the alarm on Trump’s bullying tactics, insisting it’s high time for the allies to step up and tell the White House: enough is enough.

Volkskrant columnist Bert Wagendorp went so far as to compare Donald Trump at the World Cup to Adolf Hitler at the Berlin Olympic Stadium. 

He writes, “That would be a scene that still makes sports blush with shame; never before has it sold its soul so unashamedly and allowed itself to be turned so easily into a dictator’s propaganda vehicle.”

But why shove politics into sports? Some might rebut. 

- Advertisement -

Welten argues that Trump and FIFA have already crossed that line. 

Aside from FIFA’s “peace prize” invented especially for Trump (turning football into MAGA bootlicking), America’s strict travel bans would prevent fans from at least 17 countries, including Brazil and Senegal, from supporting their team. 

As experts and idealists finally speak out against Trump’s chokehold on the world, we stand to witness the beginning of a long-repressed EU versus US duel. 

Dig what you’re reading? Get more of it! Join our WhatsApp channel or Instagram broadcast to get the latest news straight to your pocket.